Book Blogger Confessions is a biweekly meme hosted by  For What It’s Worth and  Tiger’s All Consuming Media

Monday August 6th: Making money off your blog: There was a recent controversy about bloggers charging authors for reviews (You can read about it here) which leads to this week’s question:
Almost all of us blog as a hobby in our spare time, usually for free but is there anything wrong with making money off your blog?

Should bloggers charge for reviews?
What about advertising on a blog?
When a blogger does allow book related advertising does it turn you off? Make you wonder about the honesty of their reviews?

Do you have a problem with purchase links (Amazon for example) that earn a blogger a small commission if a person purchases a book through that link?

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Almost all of us blog as a hobby in our spare time, usually for free but is there anything wrong with making money off your blog?

I’ve  never really spent a lot of time thinking about whether other book bloggers make money doing what I do for free, and so my answer to that question depends on how the blogger is making money.

Should bloggers charge for reviews?

This is the question that bothers me the most. I’ve  never really spent a lot of time thinking about whether other bloggers charge for reviews, because it’s something I have never even considered doing. I can’t say that it’s a concept that I’d never heard of before…just that it isn’t something I dwell on. Personally tho? I do think it’s wrong…even if everyone in the blogoshere is aware that you’re doing it. I’m confident that I (and everyone else here at Bookish Temptations) shares a very high level of trust with our readers, the authors whose books we review, and the publishers we deal with. We’ve all worked really hard to make BT  what it is… a blog that I’m exceptionally proud of, and one that continues to grow and evolve.

People trust that the reviews we all do here are honest, and I don’t know that it’s possible for a blogger to truly give an honest review if they are being paid to do it.  I know that many people buy the books that we recommend. Maybe they won’t all love it as much as we did, but at least they know they can count on us to share our real thoughts and feelings about it.

What about advertising on a blog?

I have no problem if a blogger chooses to do this. I think it can make the blog look cluttered and messy, and it can take forever for the page to load…but I don’t think it’s dishonest. People have the choice of whether they want to click on the ads, so to each his/her own on this one.

When a blogger does allow book related advertising does it turn you off? Make you wonder about the honesty of their reviews?

I think if I visited a site that had an abnormally high ratio of 5 star reviews, and the advertising on their site seemed directly related in some way…yeah…I might.

Do you have a problem with purchase links (Amazon for example) that earn a blogger a small commission if a person purchases a book through that link?

I think before I could answer that I’d have to do more research on exactly what is involved, but on the surface it seems fine to me.

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Interesting questions don’t you think?

I’d like to know what your opinions are now…

Tamie Xo