Unethical Blogging: Fighting Temptations

Credit: katagaci

Have you ever read a product review on a blog and taken a chance on that product only to find out that it doesn’t work or was misrepresented by bloggers? There are a lot of good things that one can talk about today’s blogging world. But there are some serious issues that all bloggers have to face as well. When you don’t have a popular blog, you don’t get too many offers from companies to advertise for them or push their products. But your blog does get some decent traffic and recognition, that’s when you are going to face some tough decisions. You are going to hear from companies that want to buy text links on your blog. Some even try to buy positive reviews on your blog. While any professional bloggers wouldn’t fall for such offers, there are unethical bloggers out there who don’t mind recommending a product to their readers as long as they get paid.

Blogging is not a get rich quick scheme. Those who have made it in this industry have worked very hard on providing value to their readers. Some have written books and created membership sites for their readers. But you can be sure that most top bloggers don’t even try to give a product a positive review without testing it properly. That’s where the idea of transparency comes in. Being transparent with your readers is the only way to build trust and keep your readers coming back for more.

Transparency

The idea here is simple. Whether you are getting paid to write a review or given a free product to keep in return for a blog post, you should always take time to discuss this with your readers. What’s the worst that can happen? So what if your readers don’t trust your review due to your connections with product manufacturers? Of course, if you have tried your best to build trust with your readers and provided real value to them in the past, they won’t mind you getting compensated for your thoughts. That’s what trust buys you.

Honesty

We all want to make enough money to lead a comfortable life without ever having to worry about those monthly bills. When you write a review, you want to make sure you keep your priorities straight. It’s too easy to write a bogus positive review for a product. But your readers are not stupid. They can figure out you have lied once they try that product for themselves. That’s when all the work you have done to gain the trust of your readers goes out of window. You may as well look for a 9-6 job when that happens.

Selling Your Soul

Not everyone is going to get caught doing bogus blog posts. But what if you get away with it for once? That doesn’t mean you can make a career out of deceiving your readers. You may not make enough money from blogging, but it can open doors for you. Your readers may help you with that as well. Once you sell your soul to these bogus advertisers, it’s going to snow ball. Your reputation will soon be out of the window, and you’ll have only yourself to blame.

Test Everything

It doesn’t matter who’s offering you a product to review. It could be Amazon, Apple, or Microsoft. Just don’t assume that the product you have gotten is great without testing it. I am sure all those companies would appreciate getting rosy reviews from bloggers. That doesn’t mean you should give high scores to those companies without testing every aspect of their products. Everybody makes mistakes but giving a terrible product great scores is more than just a mistake.

A lot of us bloggers don’t make a whole lot of money. Not many of us are going to be millionaires. There are always opportunities to make money on your blog by taking bogus advertisers and their products on. But your reputation and credibility shouldn’t be up for sale.