MommyBlogs: Reputation Still Matters Mom Blog and All

I was watch­ing The Col­bert Report (I adore Stephen Colbert) and on the show was Chris Ander­son. He was on pro­mot­ing his new book Free. I was inter­ested in what he sug­gested about a rep­u­ta­tion econ­omy, he also dis­cussed an atten­tion econ­omy.  I’m a nerd at heart.

In his book, he offers that rep­u­ta­tion and atten­tion are what is going to mat­ter in this new media world we live in. Those com­pa­nies ben­e­fit more from giv­ing things away, in this they are get­ting essen­tially free adver­tis­ing ver­sus pay­ing to adver­tise. How­ever, what he offers is that there are peo­ple will­ing to do things for rep­u­ta­tion or atten­tion that they wouldn’t do for mon­e­tary gain. They are still sell­ing them­selves but for a dif­fer­ent price.

What this got me think­ing about what the pre­vi­ous posts I wrote on The Oprah Effect on Rad­i­cal Mom­my­Blog­ging & The Rad­i­cal­ism of Mom­my­Blog­ging. The rea­son I made the link was that the orig­i­nal posts and arti­cles that I read had a lot of dis­cus­sion over what the role of money in blog­ging is sup­posed to be, how to proper dis­clo­sure about money (or free­bies), and eth­i­cal stan­dards in gen­eral that has been going on. Think of the FTC enter­ing the pic­ture on social media prac­tices & the focus on Mom­my­Blogs.  I’ve been mulling this over for a few days now and the link is even clearer for me.

Ok, fol­low along with me. This WILL get LONG. I’m a talker & I’ve been in school for pretty much my whole & I’ve warned you that I’m an over thinker.

Any­way, I con­nected what Chris was say­ing to the recent increase of news on these mat­ters for moms who blog (or MommyBloggers—however you want to describe it) & whether or not what is going on isn’t a dis­cus­sion about rep­u­ta­tion & atten­tion economies that are being altered by the fact that the mon­e­tary econ­omy is still ever present. The more I think about it the more I’m drawn to the dis­cus­sions about the threat­en­ing for shoes and other poor behav­ior over swag as noted by Mom-101 that hap­pened at the recent con­fer­ence geared toward women who blog, BlogHer, & the high num­ber of “Mom­my­Blog­gers” who were there. In addi­tion, I believe this what hap­pened at BlogHer will only add more fuel to the fire about Mom­my­Blog­gers being greedy even if it was only a minor­ity of women, (all accounts say the vast major­ity did not act unprofessional).

In this new blog­ging world as mar­ket meets media meets writ­ing, peo­ple want to main­tain rep­u­ta­tion, and let’s be real atten­tion is nice. It’s nice when peo­ple read what you write & like it. If it weren’t we wouldn’t write a blog, we’d keep a pri­vate diary under lock & key. Instead we put it out there for peo­ple to read. It’s also nice if you end up being able to have some finan­cial gain as a result of being a great writer. I don’t mean even mak­ing the big bucks, but let’s be hon­est no one would shun even mak­ing extra gro­cery money.

In our soci­ety mak­ing money off of work has been seen as a way that work has value, it’s why those who don’t earn paid income strug­gle with feel­ing a lack of social value. Our soci­ety, because it is cap­i­tal­ist, roots itself in a model that says you must earn x amount of dol­lars to be worth­while to soci­ety. I think this is bull, but it’s the world we live in. It might even play a role in why there is such a rush for swag and free­bies in the blog world, since most blog­gers aren’t going to get paid in terms of mon­e­tary cur­rency gain­ing some­thing via prod­uct can be a con­fir­ma­tion of mon­e­tary & hence social value. Con­sumer prod­ucts have mon­e­tary value to them.

How­ever, as part of the blog­ging world to make money or receive mon­e­tary value (ide­ally for your writ­ing, but hey some folks just want cash) you need atten­tion. And that leads to the ques­tion of what good is it if you get atten­tion but you lose your rep­u­ta­tion in the process, which seems to be a big issue in the whole dis­cus­sion going on.

No one wants to be seen as a sell-out, even if they have sold-out, selling-out can hap­pen, even if money never exchanges hands. I could sell myself out by writ­ing about some­thing I don’t care about just to drive traf­fic to this blog, but then I’d lose my rep­u­ta­tion that I have cred­i­bil­ity by writ­ing like that. Yah, atten­tion would go up but it would be at a price. And while this blog isn’t read by thou­sands (or face it hun­dreds) it is read by peo­ple whose opin­ions of me I DO value, like my fam­ily & friends.

When money or free­bies start to enter the pic­ture and it’s unclear why a per­son wrote some­thing, it causes a price to be paid via their rep­u­ta­tion cred­i­bil­ity. I’m not talk­ing about ads run­ning that are clearly marked as such, I’m talk­ing about things that aren’t clearly ads and clearly aren’t just hon­est per­sonal opin­ion. Mom­my­Blog­gers have been per­ceived as giv­ing their hon­est opin­ions, no holds bar, but if they are receiv­ing some cash or a large free­bie as part of offer­ing their opin­ion there is the con­cern that the opin­ion may not be as hon­est anymore.

Then comes the charge that they are greedy & when some act unpro­fes­sional at a major con­fer­ence it only cements this rep­u­ta­tion.  Even if that’s NOT the case for 99% of those women who are swept under this label of “Mom­my­Blog­ger”, the thought is out there. In a world, where rep­u­ta­tion mat­ters some­thing is lost that is highly valu­able. This is part of the rep­u­ta­tion econ­omy that exists in social media, rep­u­ta­tion can pre­ceed you & it can be made for you by sim­ply being part of a par­tic­u­lar indus­try, group, or com­mu­nity.  No one wants (I would hope) the rep­u­ta­tion of being greedy or a sell-out.

At the same time, free­bies and money for posts (yes, I know I was totally a nub & didn’t even know that peo­ple pay for posts either) can draw a bit of increased attention.  Attention is obvi­ously part of social media & is essential.  Attention means some­one is read­ing you (again some­thing peo­ple who are post­ing on the inter­net prob­a­bly don’t mind).

BUT more atten­tion equals more chances to get other free­bies & more money (even if not much money) this then causes a big­ger increase in atten­tion & a cycle is born. However, trade-off with this increase becomes the ques­tion on whether or not a per­son has a tainted rep­u­ta­tion because of their accep­tance of these things.  There is the addi­tional trade-off based on sim­ply being lumped in with those who have done things to taint their rep­u­ta­tions, here guilt by mere loose asso­ci­a­tion hap­pens (you blog & are a mom, you get lumped by mere fact of being a mom).

AND I want to be very CLEAR it’s not sim­ply the accep­tance of these things but the unclear rela­tion­ship that is forged. There are blog­gers who don’t dis­close that they got some­thing free or that they have been paid for a post, this cre­ates a cloud of sus­pi­cion that every­one is doing this even if it’s more myth than real­ity. Again there is a dif­fer­ence between the things you know are ads & the things that are hid­den ads that I’m talk­ing about. There are blog­gers who dis­close & are hon­est in every sense, even if they are try­ing to make money in this they are being upfront about it. No prob­lem with mak­ing money.

But as always the infu­sion of money cre­ates a con­fu­sion over rep­u­ta­tion and can lead to atten­tion for rea­sons that one doesn’t want, for being a sell-out as the likes of Newsweek have stated some Mom­my­Blog­gers are. There is now an inevitable process around how to reclaim rep­u­ta­tion amidst all this drama. Given there is noth­ing wrong with review­ing a prod­uct or get­ting a free­bie or even being paid to post some­thing. I am all for women mak­ing being able to earn income while nav­i­gat­ing the world of moth­er­hood, I’ve got noth­ing against a momma try­ing to do that (or for that mat­ter any­one else).  The mat­ter becomes HOW to do these things with­out los­ing rep­u­ta­tion or get­ting atten­tion for the wrong reasons.

This leads me to the fact that Blog With Integrity was launched last week. It offers guide­lines for a sim­ple eth­i­cal code. I, per­son­ally, think it’s a great idea (you’ll find the but­ton on my side­bar), but even if you don’t sign the pledge it draws to mind the way rep­u­ta­tion, atten­tion, & money con­nect. It made me think more about myself, not just here online but overall.

I know that I’m writ­ing because I love to write, it’s an out­let for me for so many rea­sons.  I lov­ing the process of shar­ing ideas, build­ing a rela­tion­ships, and I am try­ing to stay sane. I am still attempt­ing to fig­ure out all this blog­ging stuff. I’m not mak­ing money (although I’m def­i­nitely not against it) or get­ting any­thing for this blog (if I did I’d dis­close that rela­tion­ship) at this point in the game (and may never), I’m a new­bie to writ­ing in this form of social media, but I know I don’t want to lose my rep­u­ta­tion (even if only my Mom reads this post) and who I am for atten­tion dur­ing the process.  I assume that most peo­ple don’t.

(again term MommyBlog/Blogging/Blogger I know is one many don’t like but I use it because it’s what is common)

Tagged as: blog with integrity, economy, ethics, mom blog, mommy blogging, mommy blogs, reputation