Blogging For Paychecks

prostoalex writes "When you hear about blogging, you're most likely to hear about personal journals, self-expression and youngsters sharing their daily routines online. However, as Wall Street Journal notes, the word blogger can now frequently be seen in corporate job ads. Blogging jobs pay anywhere from $40,000 to $70,000 and frequently require writing copy for corporate Web sites and ability to promote on the Internet. A search for blogger and blogging on one of the job meta search engines yields several hundred open positions."

blogging=marketing?

[RayDude]

I see. So to corporate america, blogging equates to marketing.

Is this a good thing or a bad thing?

Raydude

Cash for ..ah..blogging

[Kaorimoch]

As long as they state on the blog who they are paid by, I'm fine with it. It is where they don't tell you that they get paid to do it that I get concerned about where blogging is taking itself.

Re:Meh.

[Breakfast Pants]

Reading this article makes me think we are setting ourselves up for a whole 'nother dot com boom/bust.

Wake up

[dmiller]

Wake up: the emperor has no clothes. Blogging has been owned by vested interests for a while.

Look at all the technology companies who encourage their employees to blog and wax effusive about their products. (picking a couple of easy examples) Sun, Microsoft, Redhat and many more do this.

Witness the co-opting of political blogs of all kinds during the last season of US and Australian elections. Notice the tight coupling between the language used by certain bloggers and spin crafted by political parties?

Observe the abuse of blogs to gain or destroy Google ratings.

If you think that what you are reading in a blog is somehow automatically more "real" than something you would read in an advert, press release or partisan hack's column, then you are deluding yourself. Blogs are another tool in the bag of PR and marketing people and they will continue to be used as such.

Digital Promotion

[Sundroid]

If you still think blogging is about teenagers keeping their journals, you're so 2003.

Blogging has entered business in a big way, and people getting paid to blog is a natural progression. A good blogger must be able to crank out topical posts every day, often more than one entry a day. It ain't easy. I try to keep up my graphic blog (at: http://sunandfun.blogspot.com/ [blogspot.com]) regularly and the best I can do is about one post every two days.

The lady in the Wall Street Journal article blogs for a yogurt company. I'm sure blogging is a more effective way of pulling in business than, say, sending out sample dispensers in supermarkets, which is kind of messy, plus the company has to provide all the samples that always get eaten by people who never buy. Of course, her blog will be even more popular now that she's got a write-up in Wall Street Journal.

Re:For all the whining teenagers

[Danger Stevens]

You're completely mistaken. Blogging software, while usually used for personal journals by teens, is actually just an evolution of static websites. A blog enables a writer to produce content quickly without having to worry about editing html.

It's being used to make BOATLOADS of money by such folks as WeblogsInc and others.
For more information about professional blogging, check out the guru himself: Darren Rowse [problogger.net]. Darren makes a 6-figure income simply by providing quality, regular information on a number of websites he owns and operates.

blogging for $$$==SHILLING?

[IceAgeComing]

I know "shill" is an inflammatory word to some, but that's what I equate with blogging for money. It is a natural consequence of tying salary to writing.