I was reading Felix Salmon’s article about Gawker Media and how Nick Denton is continuing the blog lord scheme of paying his bloggers based on performance.  It appears that Denton only cares about the almighty page view.  I know what Denton faces when he looks for results.  I too have that same problem as clients want to see their return on investment.  Denton sees the check the blogger gets for a salary and then matches that against the number of page views that blogger has generated.  The salary is the investment for the page view. The page view is what the advertiser is investing in as they pay Denton.

I face the same problems each month as I send out my invoices.  The client is paying a monthly contract for the blogger.  They look to me to drive traffic, raise readership of the blog and ultimately that has to turn into sales or customers.  It is not unlike the problem Denton faces.  His clients are advertisers and the return on investment is page views.  This is a very basic understanding of professional bloggers and I don’t discount the other benefits of generating quality content for companies.  This is a basic difficulty I face when dealing with the clients and their idea of our service.  I must continue to educate companies as to why  a blogger provides more than words on a page.

Bloggers are doing their jobs by providing quality content and other outreach to gather readers.  Not all blogs are easy to create large page views and create large communities of readers.  A blog that has thousands of readers a day because they talk about celebrity gossip and the latest crotch shot of Britney Spears, is not as difficult to get readers as portable toilet company that is talking about the latest breakthrough in environmentally safe chemicals and toilet paper.  The problem is that portable toilet company expects the world to be as interested in toilet paper as they are in the latest celebrity in rehab and crotch shots.

I always discuss this with companies and how they expect the blog to perform for them and their expectation of their return on investment.  They want to see thousands of people a day lining up to read what the blogger wrote.  They then equate that to some magic way of selling the reader on their service or product.  Readers equate to buyers in their mind.  This is not always the case but that is the expectation.  They figure the blogger salary into their Cost Per Acquisition (CPA).  In order to justify paying a blogger or hiring a blogger, they use this formula.  What they don’t understand is blogger is no different than any other employee in their arsenal.  They have to have employees that perform certain tasks.  They have not bought into the idea that a blogger is necessary.  Until companies become comfortable with that doctrine, I continue to try to justify the expense every month I send an invoice.  Blogger salaries are part of a marketing budget and not part of a budget for employee salaries.  Until that crosses over bloggers are always going to be judged by the “what have you done for me lately” idea.  They need to understand that 50 readers a day that are sold 50% of the time is better than 5,000 readers a day that purchase only 1% of the time. 

[photo via UC Merced]

Tris and I want to welcome the attendees that are here today listening to the presentation of Hiring Bloggers and Bloggers for Hire. This session is all about how hire a blogger and how to become a blogger for hire. We were told specifically that we were in no way supposed to make this a sales pitch from the stage so we will do all that we can to not make this what has been known as presentation conference spam. We won’t call the session “Bloggers For Hire” perhaps but we might better change the title to Hiring a Social Media Manager or Becoming a Social Media Manager.

Technorati Tags: Bloggers For Hire, Hiring A Blogger

It has been a very busy time here at Bloggers For Hire as we have been working hard on getting some blogging campaigns underway for clients.  These companies show the type of diversity we have in the work that we perform and each company had a special request when filling their needs.

Our first company I wanted to showcase was a long time client and forward thinker as it relates to blogging and business.  Omar Solis has always appreciated the hard work it takes to be a blogger and looks to Bloggers For Hire for help and assistance.  This week we launch the content for Fronteras.org.  This blog was a difficult proposition as it requires a blogger that can be bi-lingual and understand the issues related to immigration. 

Our next company is another client that understands the power of blogging and how it can increase sales and traffic to a site.  David Krug, and Log Homes Journal has joined on as a client of Bloggers For Hire and the blogger here will be discussing items related to the log home industry and other issues related to home ownership of log homes.

Finally, our last client is a completely new campaign and a very exciting one because of what they are going to allow us to do with their site, the blog and its campaign and goal.  Conventions.net is a company launched today with a brand new website and One By One Media and Bloggers For Hire will be the voice for the company behind Convention Insider.  I myself will take on the responsibilities of blogging and the best part is I get to discuss the ins and outs of that experience here on Bloggers For Hire.  You can follow along in real time as I chronicle the experience of being a professional blogger and running a blogging campaign for a client. I would like to personally thank Randy Goldberg the vision behind Conventions.net for the opportunity to share the experience with you here on our company blog.

Be sure to subscribe here and there for great examples of companies that understand the power of blogging and have given us the opportunity to represent them in their venture. As you can see we can fulfill a very diverse base of companies.

While Tris is doing the Office 2.0 gig in San Francisco in a couple of weeks, I’ll be in the Windy (Flooded) City of Chicago in September.  If you are going to be near Chicago or if you want to come out and hear some great speakers, and participate in a wonderful conference about business blogging, join me at the Blog Business Summit 2007.

Many people want to know how they can get a job as a professional blogger or get a job earning a wage at doing what they do every day anyway for free.  Easy, come out and meet me in Chicago and I’ll get you on our rolls to be in line for the next company that wants to get into the world of business blogging.  If you are a company and you have no idea how to start into the world of online social media and need someone to manage your company’s online presence, why not hire a blogger to do the work for you?  We can help you get set up with a person to help manage your blog and online social media campaign.  We specialize in getting companies into the world of blogging.

If you want to come to the show and participate in the conference, please do, and use our special code to get into the conference at a special discounted rate. When registering, please use the code P65CHI and you will get an instant savings! Once you get to the conference, look me up, I’ll be the one that is having lots of fun and talking to lots of different people about the exciting world of professional blogging.

I have been following a small debate in forums and other online social meeting places and have been trying to keep track of the ongoing dialogue of outsourcing bloggers.  Basically, when people begin to talk about outsourcing, the discussion drifts to paying people very small wages for work performed that would normally be higher priced if kept within a company.  More specifically, outsourcing has been tied to very poor economy countries such as India and Philippines and others.  In fact, outsourcing is what we here at Bloggers For Hire are doing on a daily basis.  We make it affordable for companies to have a full time blogger and a social media manager.

I ran across an interesting interview of my friend Jeremy Wright, CEO of b5media, that I thought I would pass along to our readers here.  One question and answer I really thought hit it out of the park was:

Should corporates hire people exclusively for the purpose of blogging?

That is certainly a direction some corporations are starting to go ? whether it?s Blogger Relations team members that exist as part of marketing, or Social Media professionals who work in sales or corporate communications.

On the other side, some companies are simply training their sales/ marketing/ PR/ communications teams on blogging principles so that they can engage in the activities themselves (instead of having dedicated folk).

Ultimately, the best mix will depend on each company?s corporate culture and whether an individual champion for blogging would work best or a properly trained team would.

Jeremy Wright is certainly a guy that would know how to answer that question, he has been in the blogging world more than most. 

Check out the interview, as I think Jeremy is always spot on.

We have seen companies both large and small trying to understand the “blogging principals” as Jeremy refers to and we have helped them by allowing them to test the water a little and have a temporary employee of sorts, sit behind the keyboard and allow them to see how it works in real time and in real life.  It is a unique opportunity to be able to pilot a program for your company and to see how the world of blogging could impact your company’s communication, PR and advertising areas. 

Outsourcing is becoming more popular as we all begin to live more in the virtual world.  Companies are able to hire a person that doesn’t need to spend all day in a cubicle farm but perhaps a couple hours in the evening or morning providing good quality content and a voice for their company blog.  This person can also be hired for much less than a full time employee with the accompanying price of benefits and taxes and all the other things that come with employing a blogger.

When hiring a blogger, there are many things that a company should ask about the blogger, the blogger’s background and other questions you would normally ask of an employee about to join your company.

Being a blogger is a cool new profession.  Companies are hiring bloggers at a fever pitch since the new angle to online marketing advertising and public relations is through social media.  If you want to be a professional blogger, now is a great time to get a job.  If you want to be a pro blogger and work for yourself, there are a few cons to pro blogging as this article states.

I especially like the idea that:

There is something about problogging that requires a strange personality. One that can deal with being alone for long periods of time, and yet that same person also has to be able to network, and be interesting to be around. This type of personality is rare, and also a bit odd, and so that is why it is in the con?s column of being a problogger.

I for one have far too many people (little ones) around to sometimes get any pro blogging done, but I like the idea that you have to be a little schizophrenic. 

This morning on Techmeme, I noticed that the New York Times posted an article by Barbara Whitaker entitled “Can Blogs Become a Source of Jobs?” The article is a cursory look at best at the emerging market of professional bloggers and people being hired as bloggers within companies. We here at Bloggers For Hire have seen this emerge since we began a few years ago.

More and more companies are looking to experts in the area of social media. Communication departments are hiring bloggers to coordinate with advertising, PR and marketing departments to relay the corporate message to their customers, clients and other consumers.

The article relates this to other areas of job hunting and hiring practices:

If pursuing a job as a blogger seems financially precarious, having blogging skills doesn’t hurt when it comes to looking for work — particularly in publishing, marketing, public relations and the news media.

Many friends were quoted in the article and they are also out there evangelizing the idea that hiring bloggers or employing bloggers is a new way of looking at key aspects of the online world where companies are eager to join.

Tags: advertising, Bloggers For Hire, Blogging Jobs, Blogs, Hiring Bloggers, marketing, PR, Professional Bloggers, Social Media, Techmeme

I recently ran across a post by Hillel at Jackson Fish Market regarding thoughts on hiring a blogger instead of trying to find a high priced MBA to spend all your money on a marketing campaign. I think the advice given to his friend that wanted to hire someone to handle a marketing campaign was solid advice.

Instead of hiring this person you could hire a “blogger plus”. In other words… you start a blog targeted at your target audience. It’s not about your offering per se… It’s from your company and all about the trials and tribulations of being a member of your target audience and what they spend their time doing. In fact, the best person would be a former member of that audience talking about how hard it is. Someone with personality and excellent communication skills. In addition to furious blogging (I mean 3-5 short posts per day, 5 days a week) they would troll discussion boards and forums targeted at your audience making several relevant posts a week. They could also do podcasting and videoblogging if they had interesting ideas that would best be expressed in those forms. The url should be it’s own, and not a subdomain of your main site. The blog would be “brought to you by Your Company”

This is exactly the pitch we give to many of our companies that approach us for our help in a marketing campaign through the use of professional bloggers.

Tags: Blog Marketing, Hiring Bloggers, Professional Bloggers, Social Media, Social Media Marketing

They call him their Community Evangelist.  After only a year of experience, Mario Sundar has now taken over the position as a professional blogger with LinkedIn.  One year sounds like a very short period of time to become the lead blogger for a company such as LinkedIn, but in real world time, one year is basically a veteran.  Mario was brought into the blogosphere by another blogging evangelist and a blogger I have been reading for a long time, Jeremiah Owyang.  Jeremiah is also a lead blog evangelist for PodTech.  Jeremiah states:

What’s his mission? watch his video
I informally interviewed Mario on video, you can watch as he explains his purpose as a Customer Evangelist, Congrats Mario and congratulations LinkedIn, you’ll now have a better connection with customers, communicate more effectively and continue to put a human face on your company, you couldn’t have picked anyone more friendly and genuine than Mario.

Perhaps not more friendly, but they could have picked someone more Genuine [okay I agree that was shameless, but I couldn’t resist].  I can see this position becoming more of a regular job for the likes of the early adopters, especially in the tech area and the other areas of companies that have a better handle on online marketing and advertising.  Once the position becomes tested over time, it will become certainly more mainstream.  Now is the time to practice your craft of blogging, so that more opportunities can be found by veteran bloggers!  Good Luck Mario, and thanks for preaching the blogging gospel Jeremiah.

Tags: Community Evangelist, Professional Blogger, Mario Sundar, Jeremiah Owyang, PodTech, Genuine, online marketing, online advertising, hiring bloggers, business blogging, LinkedIn

At the SXSW conference in Austin recently, I was at a bar [yeah yeah where else would I be?] and ran into a new blog friend Eric Skiff from ClipMarks.  Eric and I chatted a while, and he whipped out his Mac and began to show me this cool blog application that his company provides.  I’m always skeptic first and will always tout something if it’s easy.  I am of course the Caveman of the Blogosphere. After watching Eric for a few minutes show this really cool app, I was definitely sold.  Anything that can make a bloggers life easier is for me. 

When I returned home to Colorado, I quickly emailed Eric and wanted to get a demo to show all of my professional bloggers so they could check it out and use it if they wanted.  He was working on a demo video and he finally finished and sent me the embed and now I want to share it with everyone!

Tags: SXSW, Eric Skiff, ClipMarks, Mac, Blogging Tools, Professional Bloggers, Bolg Applications