Andy Beard left this awesome comment one the post announcing the show yesterday (if you’d like to listen to the show–listen to Shel Israel really–I have the show archived here):

I caught the end of the show and then listened to the recording.

I would love to know what you guys think of

1. People thanking their advertisers with followable links
2. People frequently tell me I undercharge for the amount of time and effort I put into all my reviews, so that would make any links I supply in a review purely editorial (which is what I firmly believe) – I write my reviews partially as a kind of consultancy, but also to demonstrate that compensated reviews can be high quality, whether compensated by affiliate sales or by a direct payment.
3. Free software which is monetized by the links (many notable Open Source Projects)
4. Providing links to people who pay you a retainer as a consultant. When you get someone like Rand Fishkin mentioning a few of his clients in a blog post and deliberately (that is what it seems to me) not including a link to them, then policies on linking really need to be specifically clarified on a blog that doesn?t have a legal disclaimer
5. Links from charities where you donate
6. Other forms of donations to people who decide to give you a link back

Everything about the discussion was very much “black & white” whereas in fact there are so many shades of grey that are perfectly acceptable, and actually in many ways darker than a comprehensive review written for some kind of compensation.

Does a company like Hewlett Packard or Universal Music Group really need to buy links for SEO, or is it really just for Buzz?

I told Andy in a comment that his comment was worth a post of its own, so without further ado…

Andy is bang on, these issues are not black and white. We covered this complex issue in about 20 minutes and didn’t have alternate points of view on for discussion. Can we do that? You freakin’ bet we can!

This might be a post where Jim and I don’t agree 100% (which is good), but IMHO I don’t have a problem with, and often do, thank advertisers with a link in a post and we (Jim and I) do link to clients. Part of it is SEO, but a lot of it is so you can visit their blog! Same for charities. If I support them, I link to them. Again I’m not thinking about an SEO benefit, I’m thinking about people finding the charity. This is probably why I didn’t even think about PPP posts being Google gaming bait.

I agree Andy, I think the cost to a company for a review is pretty paltry. Heck if I’m given a piece of software for free I’ll review it. A free copy doesn’t buy me or a good review, but I will take the time to give it a good shot. I don’t think a review on one of my blogs is equal, though, to one on yours Andy, so … well maybe I’m priced about right.

I also don’t mind links in free software in lieu of paying. Now, the bigger question is whether or not they work. That I don’t know.

As for large companies…no they don’t need the SEO, buzz, sure, SEO no. Frankly the big companies have the budgets and connections to get stuff in our hands.

I’m sure this post will bring up more questions than it answers, but hey that’s a good thing of course. If we need to do the next radio show on this topic again … so be it.

Update: Lots of great comments on this post (as I had hoped). Connected Internet poses more questions on this topic as well. One thread is why not go direct instead of through TLA or PPP:

I really can’t see the logic of signing up to the scheme. If an advertiser has decided based upon looking at your site that they want to buy a review, then why not just do the deal directly and keep all the money? By all means keep your site listed in the PPP directory so that you don’t miss out on any potential reviews that might come in via that route, but I really think that any advertising sales generated via your site should be done directly. If you’ve generated the sales lead directly, then why pay commission?

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