Advertising on Personal Blogs

I've had numerous conversations and e-mail exchanges with bloggers asking me why I don't put ads on my site. 

It's not that I couldn't use the extra money. After all, cashmere boxers, gold-laced shower curtains, and beluga mayonnaise don't grow on trees, right?  And am I the only one who cares that the price of domestic help is starting to reach stratospheric levels?  Just this past week, my personal foodtaster Toto asked for more dough because his maid needed to get the tires on her BMW rotated.  So yeah, who couldn't use a little extra green in their pockets? 

All kidding aside, I generally find the idea of advertising on personal blogs to be the complete antithesis of what blogging should be about and that's generally why I've shunned them on this site. 

However, I've never really been able to fully articulate my feelings on exactly why I dislike the idea of ads on personal blogs.  Thankfully, I have Mimi Smartypants.  As she writes in a recent post:

I got into a minor debate recently about ads on blogs, because I was naively shocked to see one of my favorites with a big old honking McDonald's ad in the sidebar. I am sure when you sign up with Federated Media or any of the other blog-ad conglomerates, you don't get much of a say in what ads show up. Which is precisely the point.

When you attach your personal output (your song, your blog, your likeness) to a corporation, you align yourself with everything that corporation has ever done. In a small way, to be sure: no one is going to hold the aforementioned blog writer directly responsible for junk-food marketing to children or the destruction of the rainforests. But the fact remains that when you get advertising money from McDonald's, you become part of their business. If that is cool with you, then fine---it would be a cold day in hell, personally, but whatever.

It is not really my intent to pick on McDonald's, as my insides are not entirely Filet O' Fish free. My point is more that, through my lame, idealistic, aging-punk, Diaryland-colored glasses, I have a hard time seeing personal web pages as a business. There is something so cool about getting to read the thoughts of people I have never met, and then over there in the sidebar is this big honking ad for a multi-billion-dollar corporation, and that punctures the pleasure balloon somewhat.

Ads are fucking everywhere. It would be nice to see just a sliver of handcrafted, non-commercial, free-to-all, personal-expression space in the world, even if just on the internet.

I couldn't agree more, Mimi. 

Now I might not be most objective guy to lecture anyone on the dangers of advertising and pervasive consumerism, given the fact that my apartment is overfilled with a random array of useless shit and makes Charles Foster Kane's basement look like an empty breadbox.

But you know the omnipresence of advertising in our daily lives is getting out of hand when parents start auctioning off naming rights for their unborn babies and college girls start tattooing corporate logos on their breasts. 

As usual, I'm not passing judgment on any personal bloggers who feel the need to post ads on their site.  Advertising is a biological impulse found throughout the natural world. Peacocks attract the attention of a mate through a multicolored feather display. Baboons signal their sexual readiness with a pair of red, swollen buttocks. And shit, my wife and I just got a great deal on some attractively priced insurance from a fucking gecko!

So yeah, you probably won't be seeing any ads on this site anytime soon (of course, should the good people over at Aston Martin feel like sponsoring the site and donating the use of one of their fine automobiles, I'll be the first in line to tattoo their logo on my ass and name my second child DB9.)

But just out of curiosity, how do you feel when you see ads on personal blogs?  Do they turn you off?  Do you even care?  If you have ads on your blog, do you feel they're worth it?  Have you ever considered removing them?  In all honesty, I've stopped reading more than a few blogs because I couldn't deal with the advertising.  Have you ever done the same? 

An inquiring mind wants to know...

Comments

[Janssen]

I guess, for me, it all depends on what the ads look like. On amalah.com, for instance, I hardly even notice the ads in her right sidebar. But other blogs, where they are right at the top, blinking, flashin, ugly, etc., I'd have to think their writing was just unbelievable to keep reading. Because, it's really just distracting (and also, it seems so "hey, look at me; I write for the MAN now, because I'm more awesome than you all).

[Brian]

I freaking hate seeing ads on personal blogs. I think it's turned the introspective nature of individual writing into a commercial affair and it detracts from the enjoyment of reading blogs. Like Janssen said, the writing has to be damn good for me to keep reading.

[monkeyaker]

I don't notice them unless they're blinking or pop-ups. So I totally don't care. I figure, hey, if you're getting enough ads to quit work and support yourself by blogging, go for it! It's the american dream....

[Red]

Ads disrupt us in what we are doing. I visit blogs for enjoyment, not for the Discover card they're offering me. If I wanted a Discover card I would have gone to Google and searched for something related. Ads waste my time. That is annoying; really annoying.

[Mandy]

Hey MD. Good post. I have never stopped reading a blog because of ads, but it turns me off a little. That being said, I'm also turned off by the "This is an Ad-Free Blog" buttons that you see. I'm committed to no advertisements on my own blog, but folks should be able to do what they want.

[SleepyNita]

As long as they do not blink or pop up and fit the design of the site, I do not mind. But some are pretty annoying and I have quit reading some blogs over annoying and intrusive advertising.

[halfmama]

After reading Paula's New List of Blogger Salaries (via a Citymama commenter), I'm ready to sell my soul. I would be psyched just to get my monthly parking paid.

That being said, I agree with Janssen. As long as the ads don't interfere with the blog itself, then it's cool. Otherwise I get annoyed.

As Citymama herself pointed out, she is putting something out there so yes, I believe she should get paid for it. Hell, I'd put up with you hawking anything from scotch to Chuck E. Cheese (as long as you don't put a big f'ing cartoon mouse in your header) to read your posts. I know I'm not the only one.

If your posts are interesting enough, I don't give a shit with whom you've affiliated yourself. If your posts make me laugh or make me think, that's all I want.

[Jess]

I think I know which blog Mimi Smartypants was talking about and I had the same (visceral) reaction...along the lines of "what the fuck?"

Just as I don't doodle company logos in my diary, blogs should be advert free.
With certain parenting blogs in particular, the ads seem really incongruous.

[Doodaddy]

Yeah, I don't really mind that much, to be honest. I tune them out, and if they help some poor mom get to BlogHer, then so be it. I'm sure I'll never have them, because I don't think they'll cut checks as small as mine would be. What's $0.000001 times 4 readers? :)

[winterwheat]

Hooray for you. I couldn't agree more. I respect people's decision to put ads on their blogs, but it rankles me that they continue to claim "this is a private blog" after they've done so. When you put advertising on your blog, you become a spokesperson for those companies. Don't like that role? Ditch the advertising. You can't have it both ways.

[Andy Broyles]

I am with you on this one all the way.

Never had em, never will.

I have also run a sports enthusiast discussion forum since 1998 and have only taken donations to fund its operation.

Way to much loss of control if you go the ad sales route.

[6th Floor Blogger]

I've only been blogging four months now, and we're only up to about 80 visitors a day. I don't know that I would get that much money from advertising, so I haven't. I'm still up in the air about whether or not I would advertise. Google AdSense isn't the most evil thing in the world, but do I'm not sure I want it tarnishing my site just yet.

As for viewing it, I honestly rarely notice. I've become so accustomed, and not just on blogs or the internet, to tuning out advertisements that I barely notice. You could give me a list of the blogs I read to guess whether they advertise or not, and I'd probably only be right 50% of the time. Some sites do overdue it, when you have to search for the actual content, then it's a big deal. It should always be site with ads, not the other way around.

[Sarah]

As long as the ads aren't big and flashing, I really don't care. I read because the writing is good. If the ads detract from that, well, I go read somewhere else. But, like Citymama says, she's putting something out there and it's certainly worth getting paid for.

[Papa Bradstein]

As others have said, it all depends on how irritating the ads are and how good the blog is.

I just dropped some Google-generated ads in my sidebar recently, hopefully in an unobtrusive enough style that all six of my readers can ignore them to focus on my blabberings. The other things in my sidebar are there as the result of reader requests or because they amuse me, but the ads are there as an experiment for work, just as I originally experimented with Blogger as part of testing blog software for work--then got hooked, damnit.

The ads are certainly not there for the money, since they'll return about enough to buy 3B half a pack of onesies by the time he's in high school. To make real money, I'd have to have lots of big flashing ads all over the page, which would certainly irritate me more than any reader. But for those bloggers who want to afford the full pack of onesies before high school, I figure they can go ahead and put those ads on their blog--my feed reader only displays the posts, not the ads, so I don't see the ads unless I go there to comment.

Most irritating to me are those bloggers who don't put their full post into their feed. I know they do this to force me to click through to their blog to see their valuable ads, but it results in me never reading their posts and consequently never clicking through to comment (and see those valuable ads). I'm not irked by bloggers placing ads around the thoughts that they're sharing as much as I am by bloggers who don't freely share their thoughts in whatever format is easiest for their readers to read them in. To me, that violates the sharing spirit of blogging more than bald-faced crass commercialism.

Oh, and let me know how the Aston-Martin deal works out, and if they need a similar ad outlet in the DC area.

[Jamie]

I find it ironic that all the parenting blogs I like to read are the ones sporting those giant Federated McDonald's ads. 'Cause you know, McDonalds is such a healthy place to take your kids to eat. Just slightly hypocritical, no?

[KC]

I think people should be able to recoup costs of hosting the blog -- tastefully. Not everybody does that, as the above comments attest.

Some people seem to be what I'd call "ad whores" and produce the ugliest blogs on the planet as a result. They should indeed be shunned.

[Pattie]

It is a bit jarring to see ads on what's essentially someone's online diary. Some of them manage to have smaller, less distracting ads, but the majority are pretty glaring and take away from the personal nature of blogs.

I can understand wanting to earn a few extra bucks, though. I briefly considered putting ads on my blog, but with a readership of about nine, any money would be a lonnnnngggg time coming. Also, I didn't like the idea of how crowded my blog would look -- ads on top of blogrolls, my Flickr badge, my email app, etc.

Good luck with that Aston Martin!

[whit]

What about your iPod ad?

I just recently added ads to my blog. My opinion will be a direct result of whether or not they make me any money.

That said,I don't mind them on blogs, as long as they are out of the way and not distracting.

The ads that I don't care for are the posts where people push items that they've been paid to review.

The fringes of a blog are one thing, but the content should be genuine.

**This comment was brought to you by Sparkletts water and Nabisco.

[Woman with Kids]

Ads on blogs don't bother me. It's the blogs that seem to be nothing but ads for different companies that drive me insane. If I wanted to see more commercials, I wouldn't have unglued myself from my television.

[Matthew]

As I think you know I have a famous blogging cousin and she and I had this very conversation a few days ago. She was adamant that I put ads on but that I market myself like a magazine - meaning I choose who advertises and I charge a rate rather than using the "click and we'll pay you" method. I thought this was a nice compromise as I would have control over who advertised on my blog. I have resisted the ads thing for a while but if I can make $12 grand a year or more and put that money into a college fund for my kids, it's hard to pass that up.

*This comment was sponsored by Whit and his bald head.

[Mama Nabi]

Believe it or not, I'm a bit clueless as to how ads work on blogs - I vaguely knew that someone got paid somehow. Ha, my blog's not the most visually aesthetic anyway so I don't know what ads would do to it.
On others' blogs? To be honest, I don't freaking care what someone else does on their own blogs - if what they write interests me, the ads don't even register with me (hence, my ignorance until recently of ads actually making money for the blogger). If I don't read their blogs, it's not due to the ads, whether annoying or tempting... it's probably because I find their writing rather tiresome.
That said, I personally wouldn't put ads on mine - I'd be afraid that I'd start writing for the numbers and not for my own peace of mind after a good vent. If I wanted to do that, I'd have gotten a real writer's job.

[dorothy]

I almost stopped reading a lot of blogs (not to mention news sites) because the ads drove me crazy. Happily the new adblock software I downloaded for firefox (available at the mozilla site) seems to kill them all. Now I have no idea who has ads on their blogs, but in principle I'm with smartypants and metrodad.

[dorothy]

I almost stopped reading a lot of blogs (not to mention news sites) because the ads drove me crazy. Happily the new adblock software I downloaded for firefox (available at the mozilla site) seems to kill them all. Now I have no idea who has ads on their blogs, but in principle I'm with smartypants and metrodad.

[Brat]

The ads don't bother me, either. I see them at pretty much every site I go to, and a blog isn't much different to me.

What I do dislike is a blog where the person has filled up every free space on the page with all kinds of crap like buttons and 'awards' and shit like that. THAT is the stuff I find distracting and uncomfortable for some reason.

I don't read because someone got an 'award'; I read because that person can hold my interest day after day.

And my idea is, if you can make money blogging, YOU GO!
.

[Sean]

I view most of the blogs I read in a RSS news reader (netvibes), so I never see the ads.