Properly disclosing blogger compensations
July 13th, 2009Author: Allison Blass
According to the July 13 New York Times article, “Approval by a Blogger May Please a Sponsor,” more and more mommybloggers are “cashing in” on the interest from PR agencies to promote products and services by charging to get a mention or product review.
Bloggers charging for products is different than working with traditional media. In traditional media, PR agencies do not pay journalists because it poses a conflict of interest and causes the journalist to be unbiased in their reporting. Now, bloggers are changing the game. There is a wide range of blogger requests. They want products to review – and to keep. They want to be paid for running giveaways. They want to be included on blogger events. They want loaner items. They want to be paid and compensated for their time, which they say is valuable.
Transparency, whether it’s a product review on a blog, a post on a forum or in a 140 character tweet, is key because bloggers want to share real, honest reviews and to be a source of trustworthy information. Another issue is whether or not there is a mix of reviews – paid and unpaid. Mommybloggers may review both products that they purchase and that were given to them, but they don’t always indicate which is which. The lack of transparency causes confusion and makes it difficult to know whether or not a product is something blogger discovered independently or something that was pitched. The new FTC guidelines that are in the works could potentially solve this. The guidelines would require bloggers to disclose when bloggers were paid or given a product for free. This will make the distinction between true opinion and PR clearer. It’s important for PR agencies and clients to insist on proper disclosure, a benefit to both the blogger and to the consumer.
Until the guidelines are established, we recommend that PR professionals and their clients develop their own individual guidelines for how to ethically compensate and work with bloggers, and also to choose the right relationships that will benefit the blogger, the client and the consumer. We work with bloggers in a way that is beneficial and ethical for everyone. It is our policy at MWW Group not to pay bloggers for writing a post, and we request that whenever a blogger talks about a produce or service received from a client in any sort of public forum, bloggers discloses that they received it from one of our clients through MWW Group. This clearly shows the reader that the blogger did receive something from a PR agency and they can make an educated evaluation of the review.
