Paid Posts and Reviews

Monday, December 03, 2007 11:30 AM

Posted by Jonathan Danylko | Tag: Opinion | Comments: 0 | View blog reactions

I know I'm a little bit late on the Google paid links shakeup party, but I'm stating a case regarding my site with paid reviews or services.

Everyone is up in arms about the pay-per-post or paid links available and Google demoting sites because of paid links (Thanks for the update, Shoemoney). Personally, I'm in total agreement about what SEO experts are saying regarding the PageRank philosophy. Ignore PageRank and continue building your site with great content.

It boils down to your site having great content and your passion for that content. Period. If you don't have great content, then yes, you won't have much of a PageRank.

Now, my stand on paid posts.

Since my audience is geared towards the technology and small business crowd (a.k.a. a Micro-ISV), I always try to create quality posts that pertain to small business web devigners. So if I receive a request from a paid posting service (i.e. Pay-Per-Post, ReviewMe, etc.) and that opportunity is relevant to my audience and they could benefit from it, I will review it.

If there is an opportunity to review a site about curtains or mechanical equipment, chances are it won't be reviewed on this site. If there are more technology or small business campaigns, then yes, I may accept the review and a posting of a review will appear so long as it benefits my audience.

I'm trying to understand why Google would penalize a site for posting relevant review geared towards my site and audience. Because I'm being compensated for reviewing a site or service to benefit my audience? Or it's not "organic?" Hmmm...

The bottom line of paid links, in my opinion, are judgement calls to the authors of the site on where they'd appear. There is nothing wrong with getting a little compensation for doing a paid post so long as it meets this criteria:

  1. The post should contain content that your audience will love and benefit from.
  2. The review should be related to the primary subject of your site.
  3. It has to be a well-written quality post that definitely portrays your site is meant to give a solid review of a service or site.

What is your viewpoint on paid posts or reviews?

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