Initial (3am) Response to TechCrunch
I got the dreaded “3am wakeup call” from Darren. TechCrunch had written up the change in our blogger pay announced last night. I wrote a response. It got moderated. Shai tried to copy my response and hers was moderated too. So here it is in short form, we’ll have a full response in the AM. Just wanted to at least get the Trackback in before comments on the post went off track:
That said, the new pay system isn’t about cutting pay. For many bloggers there will be a cut in pay, but that is purely due to the factor hinted at in the quote: a change in stats.
As an industry, as you know, blogging (or at least media style blogging) has had to evolve its analytics and stats. Gone are the days where one company can say they have 30MM pageviews/month another can say 50MM and another can say 70MM and they all be telling the truth when their actual traffic is actually the same.
The fundamental reason for the “pay cut” is that we’ve moved from a very inaccurate stats package (AWStats) to a very accurate one (Omniture) and for many blogs the old system over-inflated their traffic by an average of 60% ish.
The blogs that are seeing the largest base pay cut (ie: pre-bonuses, which can add up to a couple of hundred dollars per month) are those in the 0-10K pageviews/month range. A range where bloggers would make pennies or small dollars doing it independently.
But, per the email, there isn’t a blog in the network getting a net CPM lower than $4. Is this a cut in pay? Maybe. But I’m not aware of anywhere else where hundreds of bloggers can get guaranteed a $4 CPM (plus bonuses) to blog about niche subjects. It’s a very fair CPM (before bonuses) and well inside industry averages (at the high end, even).
That said, that doesn’t mean this isn’t painful for bloggers. And that’s why we worked very closely with our Channel Editors to find something that was as fair as possible given the change in analytics and stats.
It isn’t perfect. It can’t be perfect, given the change in stats. But we do feel that it’s as fair.
POSTED IN: General
2 opinions for Initial (3am) Response to TechCrunch
B5media Revamps Pay Model, Bloggers Lose Money | The Blog Herald
Oct 3, 2008 at 6:06 am
[…] tried to respond to the post, but his comments are apparently getting caught in moderation, so he posted it on his blog for now. He points out the obvious culprit: As an industry, as you know, blogging (or at least […]
The New b5media Pay Structure : Network Blogging Tips
Oct 3, 2008 at 1:43 pm
[…] Jeremy Wright of course responded at his own blog: Initial (3am) Response to TechCrunch […]
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