I made this point very clear over at the online training program at WAHOL!
I made it clear on this blog many times before!
John Chow made it clear on the interview we did before (Watch it here)
In over 200 blogs that I get their RSS feeds on my Google reader, there is an average of 7 out of 10 bloggers that is pushing their business or affiliate programs or whatever they want to advertise!
7 out of 10!!
That is a lot.
As a web surfer and a blog reader, when I get the feeling of “You have to buy this product” on any blog, I automatically unsubscribe from it’s feeds and I may never go back to read it. Why? Because if I “NEED” something, I’ll just go to amazon.com or eBay.com or I’ll do my own mini research using search engines to find out what it is that other people are saying about this product or service. The people that actually bought it before and wrote a review about it (On the shopping site, not on their blogs), and I just naturally compare and decide to buy it or not.
In all of my seminars, I encourage everyone to get social, join facebook or twitter, to socialize, not to blast your business and product. My advice is normally this:
Be nice, become friends or re-connect with old friends, once in a while mention your service or products and the money will come later. It normally comes later (and lots of it) only by sending out good Karma.
What goes around, comes around!
That is very true, when looking at blogs or newsletters with literary tons of affiliate banners or “Pay Now” buttons, I just get sick and surf away immediately.
Check out this blog’s posts, only every once in a while I include any affiliate link to make commission or to sell something, instead, I concentrate on sharing knowledge and spreading the word about the good stuff that we can all share. Yet again, I am still making some cash to live on, (let me rephrase that), I am making great living from this blog thanks to other people and companies that ask me to advertise here (On the side!) without having to do anything more than what I love doing (Blogging).
Another example is the famous iJustine she started her online life casting just because she have a passion for it, now, YouTube pays her a share of their advertising revenue as a way of saying thank you for bringing more people to us, even on her blog at TastyBlogSnack.com she offers to connect with here on any of her online profiles “THEN” there is a small PayPal donation button “After” everything else, on her Twitter account she has her bio as: ” I am the Internet!” plain and simple.
I am not saying don’t promote your business, I am saying promote it in places where promotions belongs to, go write a feedback on amazon or write a review (or even a giude) on eBay, go to the company’s blog (like at Dell) and write about it and incude your affiliate link or go to another company blog (Like at ThinkGeek) and comment on posts there with what you honestly think of their products and again include your affiliate link in the comment.
But, when it comes to your own blog, do it to share your knowladge, I know that if we all do that, the world will become a much better place to be at.
Did anyone that follows me on Twitter take a look at my bio there? It’s says: “Bio: Be You, Be cool, Be nice” That is all I do 😉
There is a lot more I can ramble about about this topic, but that’s another story! Get the “FREE” RSS to keep updated 🙂
And before you go chopping your laptop because of all the advertising on it, just comment below and answer this question: Why do you “Really” blog?
