Blogging meets product placement

People will often ask me, how do you make money blogging?

My sad answer has been,

" I don't."

I quickly add that I'm trying to figure that out. It seems that there are some bloggers who have already done that. I'll take a pass.

According to the Boston.com (requires registration to read the entire article), the online version of the Boston Globe, bloggers are now making money - pathetic as it is - by mentioning companies in their blogs. It's the blogging equivalent to product placements in movies and TV. .

"Jeff Cutler has never purchased anything from Dot Flowers, but you might think otherwise, reading the Hingham resident's blog.  "No more driving to the corner to buy flowers and hand-deliver them," he wrote on his Web page. ''Nope. Now I go online to places like Dot Flowers.com and 1-800-Flowers. I like Dot a little better just because of the personal touch."

Dot Flowers' ad agency paid Cutler $5 this spring to promote the florist and put a link to its website on his blog, or online journal, short for web log. Cutler, who does not disclose the payment on his blog, is one of more than 2,000 bloggers whom marketer USWeb enlisted to hawk products and services. That helped the nascent florist double its sales in the first three months and shoot up near the top of Google's search list, according to USWeb."

Will I ever take $5 to mention Dot Flowers? Absolutely not. Do I have a price? Not in this blog.

Here's a peek into my Gemini life. In my business, I consult with companies on marketing communication issues. I encourage my clients to blog.I have not suggested that they pay bloggers to hock their products and services.

If and that's a big IF, I were to ever advise a client to seek out bloggers as shills, I would recommend that the bloggers disclose their arrangement.

I love advertising when I know its advertising. Blending those lines just doesn't sit right with me.

Call me old-fashioned, I just don't think I can do it. FunnyBusiness is a journalistic endeavor. When I'm writing FunnyBusiness, I adhere to the ethics I value as a journalist. That includes that very clear wall between advertising and journalism. I will never write about a product or service in this blog for money.

Yes, advertisers and sponsors are welcome. In fact, I'd love to have many advertisers, as long as the people who read this blog understand that the advertisers are advertisers.

Do I think its wrong for bloggers to get paid to promote products? Not at all. Blogging is not always journalism. In fact, that's one of the things mainstream journalists complain about. If it looks like journalism, reads like journalism, is it journalism?

Obviously not. Maybe those of us who consider ourselveshournalists should have some kind of icon on our blogs that lets readers know we are not going to be promoting products for a fee or in exchange for free tickets to concerts and theaters.

I would prefer if people disclosed that they are getting paid to mention a product or service. But that's my values. It's because I look at blogging as an outlet for journalism. Not everyone does.

Most bloggers not have the voice of their former news director John Greene echoing in their ears. The occasion was the morning talk show. I was the substitute "hostess". The guest was a starlet promoting some movie. Prior to going on air, John said to me,"she can't mention the name of the movie, that would be promotions and this is a news program."

It's been a long time since that stupefied starlet looked at me in complete bewilderment, when I told her we wouldn't be mentioning the movie title because my news director wouldn't allow it. At the time I thought John was being unreasonable.

I owe John an apology. You weren't being unreasonable at all. You knew by crossing that line we'd slide down a slippery slope that would be impossible to climb up.

Unfortunately, there are very few people still standing on John's side of the line.

I wish there were more John Greene's in this world.