Image Credit: kt literary ~ Click Image to Read Ethical vs Effective
Each of us must decide for ourselves where we stand ethically.
There are basically three camps:
ANYTHING FOR A BUCK
These bloggers will do whatever generates the most money regardless of who it hurts. Common strategies are:
- Promoting ebooks, products and services they know aren’t worth buying as long as they earn money on them.
- Attacking other bloggers when they are getting high visibility to use controversy to generate more traffic which makes them more money.
- Recommending strategies they know – or should know – could get their readers banned or their accounts deleted. Even when outed in the comments of their own sites they don’t stop recommending them.
There are many very prominent blogs in the how to make money online niche that never get mentioned here. These are the reasons why. [Update: I just saw an example of a blogger who appears to be making money and whose blog has strong Alexa numbers who is using testimonials from the big get-rich-quick hucksters. The content appears to have been professional written for him. Remember that the illusion of being successful is easily created if you pay enough or have the right connections. Do not fall for it.]
GO ALONG WITH THE CROWD
This is where the majority falls. They probably feel that if others are doing something it must be fine until someone gets bad publicity about it. When that happens, they pretend not to know the people who are getting bad publicity. If they get caught they deny culpability or plead ignorance.
Many bloggers currently operate in this area and could go either way. If their goal is to make money – especially if they have fallen for the illusion that you can get rich quick – they are more likely to end up in the ‘Anything for a Buck’ camp and later have serious regrets.
HIGHLY ETHICAL
The highly ethical person does the right thing even though it means limiting how much money they can make or taking a public stand may cause the majority in the middle to unfollow them or stop reading their blogs.
Once you decide who YOU are
You have to decide what to do about others.
HOW TO NETWORK:
Now that you know who YOU are you can better decide how to interact with each of these groups. Here is what I choose to do:
HIGHLY ETHICAL:
These are the people I trust and collaborate with – others who choose to be highly ethical. I make supporting them my priority and spend my time supporting their efforts. I mention them often here and add them to my lists.
We encourage highly ethical bloggers to join
DoFollow CommentLuv communities
While not everyone on every list is highly ethical or someone I would trust with my PayPal password, they are all either almost that trustworthy or moving in that direction.
GO ALONG WITH THE CROWD:
This is where the majority of people are and they have their own decision to make. I interact with them regularly. I follow them, help them in any way I can, and sometimes I’ll comment in and share their posts.
Because there are only so many hours in a day, while I don’t mind supporting their efforts they are not my primary focus. I reserve most of my time for the highly ethical bloggers, causes and an occasional client.
I might even write guest posts on their blog if by doing so I benefit others more than I benefit them.
ANYTHING FOR A BUCK:
I ignore (don’t read, don’t comment in, and don’t share) the content of the ‘Anything for a buck crowd’ because I don’t want to encourage anyone to emulate their lead or accidentally share a dangerous strategy I might have read in one of their blogs.
You don’t always know what they recommend
is unethical or might get your accounts
banned until it is too late.
It is critical for highly ethical bloggers to seek each other out now while our blogs are still being indexed by Google and Twitter is only censoring either some tweets or possibly only the accounts of some Twitter users.
We are ALL part of the 99% and NOW is the time to take back our freedom
OCCUPY WALL STREET:
Since I started tweeting about the Occupy Wall Street movement, many of my tweets are no longer showing up when I search for growmap. (All tweets you send should show up when you search for your username because your username is in every tweet.)
What I have been writing about why the economy is failing for over three years now explains why people are protesting as do my tweets and comments. You can see my #ows tweets and read my comments in Livefyre on any site that uses that commenting system to see why I support what they’re doing.
You can also search for Occupy Wallstreet on Google+ and Occupy Wall Street on YouTube and elsewhere.
For more information see:
- OccupyTogether (@OccupyTogether #OccupyTogether) – pointers to at least 115 cities so far plus a number of state hubs; meetups in 840 cities and growing
- Where to find Facebook Occupy pages
- Occupy Twitter Usernames and associated links
Does anyone else think it suspicious that the Livefyre link to TPMIdeaLab’s
IT’S SPREADING: Occupy Wall Street Now A National Movement
is BROKEN so we can’t share it on Twitter, Facebook, etc.Update: Comments are no longer visible on that post.
The Livefyre link that is “broken” is http://fyre.it/x4u
FOUR hours later it is STILL not working.
How long does it take you to fix a broken link?
LiveFyre Tweet 4 Hours Later Link to Occupy Wall Street post STILL broken
The link returns only: “Not Found: The requested URL /idealab.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/10/mt-preview-923e917f1d7923e80b244879a324663e3be55705.php was not found on this server. Apache Server at 50.56.28.37 Port 80″
BLOGGERS: Do NOT use third party commenting systems
like Livefyre, Disqus, or Intense Debate that are EASILY CENSORED.Use CommentLuv instead and put together collaborations of bloggers
in your niches and geographically targeted blogs
so you can find each other!Do NOT use Akismet because it censors
the most intelligent bloggers.
Use the free Akismet alternative GrowMap anti-spambot plugin
or the new CommentLuv Premium plugin instead.
This will become increasingly important as Google starts dropping posts and blogs from their index. The Chrome block feature as I explained in Crowdsourcing Failures and loading time are the perfect excuses for them to do that.
What about you? Have you given where you stand ethically or the Occupy Wall Street movement any thought? As always, you are invited to comment and leave relevant links to related posts or comments elsewhere.
{ 45 comments… read them below or add one }
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Twitter: matthewacoleman
April 18, 2012 at 12:37 am
It will always be a struggles in this issue…it’;s like good vs evil…all i know is that when you put something out there chances are you cant take it back
Twitter: levelanalytics
November 23, 2011 at 7:43 am
Great post, and thank you for pointing me to it last night.
There’s a lot of ways to approach blogging. For me, it’s always been about long term value. My goal was always to build a readership around a subject matter I know well and love (web analytics).
Admittedly, there’s not a lot of “get rich quick” schemes in web analytics, so my “ethical stance” has naturally been governed and enhanced by market conditions. In the long run though, as more and more people take an interest in the topic, I think I will ultimately benefit from being a straight shooter.
It was nice Tweeting with you last night, even though we met under some bizarre circumstances
Kevin Webster would love you to read ..Complete Local Web Analytics
Twitter: GrowMap
December 5, 2011 at 6:16 pm
Hi Kevin,
Sorry for the huge delay. I probably had this open to reply to one of the many times FireFox crashed and forgot to come back to it. There is a consistent theme that runs through the choice of ethical versus get-rich-quick and that is long term good for all versus short term want it now.
There are far too many people who don’t care if everyone else starves as long as they have plenty. That attitude is going to be very dangerous in the coming years. They probably don’t realize that the main reason people don’t steal or kill is the unwillingness to risk what they have.
When many people have nothing left to lose and are desperate, the ones who only care about themselves are going to be truly dangerous to the haves that are left.
As I told a wealthy person years ago at the Keeneland Thoroughbred sale (who we had invited to sit at our table because there are so few seats available), your luxury vehicles and houses behind locked gates only give you an ILLUSION of safety. Bullets pass right through vehicles, you have to get in and out of them, and as anyone with a television should realize by now doors are easily bashed open and windows are even less of a deterrent.
When people have nothing left to lose many will decide they might as well kill you for your Beemer because their lives can’t get much worse and if they get caught at least they’ll have a roof over their head and hopefully regular meals (although in some prisons that isn’t a certainty).
I agree that you WILL ultimately benefit from honesty and integrity. I am happy to have “met” and appreciate your letting me know about that site so I could immediately remove it.
growmap would love you to read ..How to Increase Sales: Learn from Those Who DO
Twitter: JennySweets_com
November 11, 2011 at 1:20 am
I’ve always wanted to proudly wear a white hat and be an ethical marketer. Many times in conversations with marketing friends or on Skype, I’ve mentioned the fact that being an ethical blogger seems to limit the income possibilities- but that’s just how it has to be. I mean .. I grew up wanting to be She-Ra for pete’s sake- and she was very moral, loving, kind, HONEST. How could I be a superhero if I used dirty tactics?
Now that I think about it.. that childhood desire to be like She-Ra is probably why my blonde hair goes all the way to my tail *chuckle*
Jenny Barron would love you to read ..Social Media Addiction – Trained Like Pavlov’s Pups!
Twitter: GrowMap
November 17, 2011 at 3:52 pm
Welcome to our collaborations and the DoFollow CommentLuv community Jenny. While being highly ethical limits most chances to promote get rich quick schemes that only work for the first people involved, in the long run you will build a business you can be proud of that makes money more consistently.
What the black hatters and con artists don’t tell you is that the main reason they make money is that they build huge lists (which you CAN do), collaborate with others (which we ARE building) so they can do big launches with bonuses (which can also be done ethically).
They primarily sell “how to get rich” products teaching methods that only work if YOU already have a big list and know how to do big launches to other big lists. The reason THEY can make big bucks in hours or days is the lists and the cross-promotion – but they don’t tell newbies that.
There is no such thing as an ethical “get rich quick scheme” that works that I have ever seen. I invite anyone who can provide an example of even one that worked to do so.
Ethical businesses do grow slower but they also last longer and have more loyal buyers so in the long run it is always better to be ethical.
growmap would love you to read ..What TO Tweet on Twitter: How to Write Better Tweets to Get More Followers, Retweets and Traffic
Blogging is most easiest way to promote your interest, product, any thing you wish! & its also more beneficial for Blogging for Money! Today’s most of the visitor of website know about Blogging….Nice Info ..
Thanks for this
Twitter: addisonskanks
October 22, 2011 at 10:35 pm
For the love of money is the root of all evil.
We cannot stop them from being unethical but it would be a great idea to stop interacting with them. I know it could be considered as indifference but in the online world, it could be the best tools we have to fight against unethical blogging. Also, posts warning other people of these unethical bloggers would be great.
Noel Addison would love you to read ..Selling Ice Cubes to Eskimos
Twitter: GrowMap
November 9, 2011 at 1:33 pm
Hi Noel,
The reason you will not see posts warning about unethical bloggers is because they are black hatters who know all the ways to make your blog disappear from search engines. It is unfortunately not that hard to get someone’s blog dropped from Google by actions they have no control over.
They will also make it a major priority to smear you, your business, and your brand all over the Internet – and keep fabricated lies about you on the first page of Google indefinitely to cost you business and embarrass you. Because most people are in the “Go Along with the Crowd” group – as soon as the mud begins to fly they will abandon you and pretend they don’t know you.
Unfortunately, most people are not very loyal and will distance themselves for fear the black hatters will target them next – and most people believe far too much of what they read even when it is ridiculous and obviously fabricated.
growmap would love you to read ..Bloggers: Are You Doing Link RoundUps? Or Recommending Each Other for FollowFriday #FF ?
What has our society turned into? Taking advantage of anyone they can trick for a quick buck. What happened to helping one another for a common goal? I guess that is long gone as well.
I do hope we can turn this thing around before it’s too late.
Twitter: GrowMap
November 9, 2011 at 2:04 pm
Hi Linda,
I believe that society is how it has always been with most people being almost totally self-absorbed and the few highly ethical, helpful people being victims of the con artists over and over until they get old and wise enough to recognize them before they take advantage.
The difference is that now it is fashionable to be greedy, selfish, and unethical and books lauding businesses that take advantage of others are best sellers and because of that it is now more obvious that we live in a world that is basically evil.
When I was twenty I traveled to the east coast from California for the first time. At that time in California people who were male chauvinists knew better than admit it and pretended they weren’t while on the east coast people who were NOT male chauvinists pretended they WERE because that was what was socially acceptable there at the time.
IMHO, what ethical people must do is seek each other out, share what they know with each other, and ignore unethical people altogether whenever possible.
growmap would love you to read ..Small Business Internet Marketing: Where to Start
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