Bloggers for Dollars

Move over ReviewMe, PayPerPost Direct is in town. And PayPerPost Direct, you must be doing something right because you seem have a lot of people shaking in their boots.

As of yesterday PayPerPost has made it possible for advertisers to order reviews directly from a blog. The new service is called PayPerPost Direct and this method of blog advertising is simple - a blogger places a special widget on their blog and through that widget an advertiser can request a blog entry as well as negotiate directly with the blogger. This in essence cuts out the middle man (yes, it cuts out PPP) and the fee is only 10% above the negotiated price. Some other blog advertising services charge a whopping 35-100%!

I know a lot of reviews are popping up lately that are comparing ReviewMe to PayPerPost Direct, and I suppose I could do that too. But I'm going to out on a limb here and ask why a blogger would feel like they have to pledge their loyalty and choose between PayPerPost Direct and ReviewMe or any other blog advertising services? I'm a freelance blogger, and if I can do the same job for more money then by golly that is exactly what I'm going to do.

John Chow, the self proclaimed King of Evil, is saying that PayPerPost Direct fails because "PayPerPost doesn’t have a publisher marketplace". Now if John Chow is really as evil as he claims to be I would think he would use both services to his advantage instead of touting one over the other. (Unless he has a vested interest in one of them that I don't know about.)

Mr Chow says that "most review orders come because of the marketplace and not because an advertiser visited the blog and saw the button". Wait a minute, nobody is saying you have to take yourself out of the ReviewMe publisher's marketplace. And nobody says (that I know of anyway) that you can't be in PPP Direct's publisher marketplace as well (when they roll it out). But I sure as heck would replace that "Get Reviewed by this blog for $400.00" that nets $200.00 (doh!) with a widget that says "PPP Direct - A post on this blog is $400.00" which would result in me keeping the whole cotton picking $400.00! To me that's not really evil at all. I'd call that a no-brainer. :)

Mr. Chow goes on to ask "and if the advertiser found you directly, why not deal with him directly instead of through PayPerPost?" My answer would be the same question to him. Yes, John, why do you do that with the ReviewMe button you have on your blog? John, why not deal with your advertiser directly instead of through ReviewMe? What's the difference between you using the ReviewMe button and you using the PPP Direct button if you get most of your review requests through the publisher's marketplace anyway? Oh, I know what the difference is. In Mr. Chow's case the difference is negative $200.00, hehe.

But seriously, one of the benefits of PPP Direct over dealing directly with the advertiser is the safety and security of having the money put into an escrow type of account where you can be assured of being paid for your work. There are other benefits too that you can read in this blog post.

The bottom line is that if you're going to put any button at all on your blog to solicit reviews, for goodness sakes go with the one that will pay you 100% of your asking price. But if you really are happier receiving 50% instead of 100% stick with your ReviewMe button. I opt for PPP Direct and 100% for myself. :)