Payperpost just recently introduced PPP Direct to help bloggers with their blog ads. PPP Direct is quite a departure from their ‘classic’ version of the PPP marketplace.

How it works

Simply put: Bloggers can install a simple badge in their sidebar which is available in the PPP account >>> ppp tools section. It has the words “Hire Me” printed on the front. Other versions include the pricing. In fact, bloggers can set the pricing in the blogs section, though I had problems getting a pricing set properly last night when I tried.

Advantages

For bloggers there are some considerable advantages to this approach: pricing is transparent. If you are hired are for $5, then that’s what you get! Additional transaction costs are covered by the advertiser. It’s difficult to tell how much PPP actually makes, but it is only about 5% of the total amount gross, its net margins must be quite small! Probably because they are only acting as the intermediary regarding billing, payment and quality control. The other 5% seems to go to Paypal for transaction costs!

ReviewME vs. PPP Direct

ReviewME charges upto 50% of the total, but then their system is different: they operate a kind of marketplace or store front where advertisers can choose and compare which blogs they want to have feature their products. With PPP Direct, it’s the bloggers who are doing this themselves.

Does it work for the advertisers?

To be frank, PPP Direct doesn’t in the short term make much sense for PPP. It will only allow advertisers, esp. the smaller ones, to choose specific bloggers, if they can find them. But larger advertisers with dozens, or even hundreds of opps may still prefer to go to the marketplace. It is likely more efficient for them. But for smaller advertisers, the ability to choose which blogs you can go on and who gets to write about you is significant. You can target your writers much more carefully.

And the new bloggers?

For bloggers, especially those who ‘grew up’ with the classic PPP, it will allow them to be hired for specific jobs. Many older bloggers are already familiar with finding projects outside of PPP or indeed any other paid for blogging system, and know how to find more rewarding work that way. It also offers security for newer bloggers by working with an established company, one that they already know and trust. In fact, the escrow type functions that PPP provides will really work to bloggers’ advantage.

Overall, this is likely going to help cement PPP’s reputation with its bloggers. In the short term, though, without the marketplace for advertisers to pick and choose conveniently, it won’t really be as convenient for advertisers. But I’m told that the Direct marketplace is coming once enough bloggers sign up for the service.

For more information, visit the video about the service on PPP’s blog.

For those of you interested in Payperpost articles, I’ve been writing them for quite some time. In fact, you can read more articles about Payperpost on this blog.

In his long series of posts, Alex King has been looking at how to monetize his blog. In this article that I suggest you look at, you will see how he struggles with the idea, but finally accepts that, to continue what he is doing, some degree of monetization is going to help.

He looks at some great ways to monetize and analyzes their success or failure, both monetarily and in terms of his own philosophy. I’ve always respected Alex King’s blog as both highly original and very quality focused. He writes:

When I first launched alexking.org back in 2002, I didn’t plan to make any money from it or do any advertising on it. …

Much has changed since then, primarily the fact I no longer have a “day job” and this is no longer “stuff I do in my spare time”. Instead, this is “stuff I turn down paying work to do”. I have no expectations of getting fully compensated for the content, software and plugins I make freely available here, but if I can bring in a couple of bucks through ads and donations it helps me justify the time I spend on these projects.

Highly recommended overview of some of the issues related to monetization. Well worth reading, too. Hence, this is my more reading article of the day!