- 3 new video ad products – where advertisers can pay bloggers to create videos about their products, where they can run ads before and/or after the video reviews and where advertisers can give bloggers multimedia elements for their reviews.
- targeting capabilities – letting advertisers target their opportunities to different segments of the blogosphere – categories.
- a unit that combines disclosure of ad affiliation and a format giving more advertiser control – a pop up style box that shows who the message is sponsored by and that shows the advertisers logo (something that advertisers control the look and content of).
- tiered blogger ranking payments – ranking blogs by their Alexa, Google and Technorati rankings so that higher profiled bloggers are paid more.
I’m glad that PPP has moved to a disclosure model over the last month or so and think that some of these new features make their service more useful both to bloggers and advertisers.
I’m not really a fan of pop up elements on a blog so the pop-up disclosure unit doesn’t appeal – however until I see it in action I’ll with hold judgement on it.
As I’ve said previously – I’m not really into writing paid reviews on a blog – however I’m not completely opposed to the idea IF there is disclosure. I also think bloggers should think carefully about the relevancy of the review they are doing to their blog and should put considerable effort into genuine and useful reviews.
I’ve actually see a few paid reviews lately that have both impressed and frustrated me. On the one hand I’ve seen a few bloggers writing genuine and useful reviews for products on their blogs.
In other instances some of what I’ve seen produced as paid reviews have been nothing much more than republished press releases or promotional materials – all this second rate ‘review’ does is frustrate and anger readers.
The key with successful paid reviews is similar to the key to successful content of any sort – make it worthwhile for your readers and you’ll not only earn a few extra dollars for your review but also help grow your blog into something worthwhile.
