It’s Your Business Don’t Be Bullied
These days, there are many ways for a blogger to earn money. From the controversial Pay Per Post to the ubiquitous Adsense, to the long standing affiliate program.
As a publisher, marketer and blogger I welcome all those opportunities that these programs offer. But sometimes, you need to be true to your own business and this is what I mean.
When PayPerPost first launched, I as usual, signed up and checked it out. I submitted a blog – this one and had no trouble getting it accepted.
Unfortunately, none of the offers were something I want to blog about, nor were they products I cared to recommend to readers who graciously let me into their RSS subscription list. At other times they just were plain irrelevant.
So I dropped this blog and submitted another blog. A less business related one that would likely open more opportunities to me. But here’s where everything went south.
They rejected the blog – which is no biggie to me. What really got under my skin for the rejection was, the archives must be categorized by date so they can find out at a glance if I meet the 20 posts in 90 days criteria.
So, they are asking me to do their work for them. I still would’ve obliged if they gave me the option to send them direct links to the archive pages what are in chronological order but no such chance was given. The pages are there, I just don’t display the links to them.
Ultimately, I decided, this is my blog, I will design and lay out my blog the way I want to. I will not re-organize my blog design just so I can take on Paid posts.
Stubborn? Maybe. But there is something to be learned here. It doesn’t matter what the purpose of your blog/website is. In the chase to earn money, we must remember this is our business, not someone else’s so don’t let them run it for you.
Also, there are many ways to earn. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. In this case, I didn’t need them since the blog earns from other more passive ways.
What about you? What would you have done? Do you think it’s no big deal to change your blog for a program? You tell me.
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I think it depends on what they were wanting. In this case, I might have went ahead and added an obvious archive link. Of course, it might also have depended on what mood I was in that day. LOL
I can’t remember which site it was I applied for, but it was a similar paid to blog type site, and I was turned down because my blog was not on the root level. They wanted http://www.singlewahm.com NOT http://www.singlewahm.com/blog and that was NOT a change I was willing to make. Not to mention I thought it was too stupid of a rule. 🙂
I think it depends on what they were wanting. In this case, I might have went ahead and added an obvious archive link. Of course, it might also have depended on what mood I was in that day. LOL
I can’t remember which site it was I applied for, but it was a similar paid to blog type site, and I was turned down because my blog was not on the root level. They wanted http://www.singlewahm.com NOT http://www.singlewahm.com/blog and that was NOT a change I was willing to make. Not to mention I thought it was too stupid of a rule. 🙂
Hey Shannon, I think that’s a crazy rule too.
Hey Shannon, I think that’s a crazy rule too.
I think you have to be true to your readers, and so I applaud your decision. I am also working on making money online (and off) and I think it is critical that I can look at myself in the mirror occasionally. If I were to sell out to get a buck or two, I don’t want that to hurt or worse BORE my readers. Like James brausch said on his blog, this is not “traffic”, these are real people and we are trying to build trust. I am glad you turned down the stupid company and their stupid rules.
I think you have to be true to your readers, and so I applaud your decision. I am also working on making money online (and off) and I think it is critical that I can look at myself in the mirror occasionally. If I were to sell out to get a buck or two, I don’t want that to hurt or worse BORE my readers. Like James brausch said on his blog, this is not “traffic”, these are real people and we are trying to build trust. I am glad you turned down the stupid company and their stupid rules.
Hey Wolf,
Thanks for the input. That is true though traffic = people and we always need to remember that.
Hey Wolf,
Thanks for the input. That is true though traffic = people and we always need to remember that.
I agree with you. As a new blogger you can get so bogged down in the details. If you are constantly changing your set up you will be so busy you won’t have time to provide good content! Sometimes you just have to say “this is how it’s going to be” and see who you can work with that way.
I agree with you. As a new blogger you can get so bogged down in the details. If you are constantly changing your set up you will be so busy you won’t have time to provide good content! Sometimes you just have to say “this is how it’s going to be” and see who you can work with that way.
It’s these rules that are stopping me getting involved with a lot of these sorts of things. There is one where you have to link everyone else in the group in your blogroll. I can understand the rule, however most of the other blogs are not related to the theme of my blog, so I’m not sure I want to list them all.
It’s these rules that are stopping me getting involved with a lot of these sorts of things. There is one where you have to link everyone else in the group in your blogroll. I can understand the rule, however most of the other blogs are not related to the theme of my blog, so I’m not sure I want to list them all.
I concur Lynette. I applaud your decision as well. Doing business by the book without compromise 🙂
I concur Lynette. I applaud your decision as well. Doing business by the book without compromise 🙂
As a former Pay Per Poster, I can tell you that this is just the tip of the iceberg with them. I had no problem with that rule because that was the way I already had my blog set up anyway, but they have lots of other rules that try to dictate how their bloggers run their blogs. I finally had enough of it and said farewell to them.
Kudos to you for sticking to your guns!
As a former Pay Per Poster, I can tell you that this is just the tip of the iceberg with them. I had no problem with that rule because that was the way I already had my blog set up anyway, but they have lots of other rules that try to dictate how their bloggers run their blogs. I finally had enough of it and said farewell to them.
Kudos to you for sticking to your guns!
Lynette,
I think it depends on some factors like 1) how much do you need the money; 2) how many blogs you have; 3) how much you need the money. 😉
Since I don’t know anything about Pay Per Post, maybe I’d better just shut up. Is there decent money in it? LOL
greg
Lynette,
I think it depends on some factors like 1) how much do you need the money; 2) how many blogs you have; 3) how much you need the money. 😉
Since I don’t know anything about Pay Per Post, maybe I’d better just shut up. Is there decent money in it? LOL
greg
Lynette I was pretty pissed off when they did the same thing to me. They rejected Vegan Family Living (the old theme) because I had a static front page.
That just got my goat. I belong to Payper post but I have yet to do anything because one I don’t have the time and two, well, I am still pretty pissed….LOL!
Lynette I was pretty pissed off when they did the same thing to me. They rejected Vegan Family Living (the old theme) because I had a static front page.
That just got my goat. I belong to Payper post but I have yet to do anything because one I don’t have the time and two, well, I am still pretty pissed….LOL!