The Sounding Board

As many of my colleagues, readers, and clients know, I have been heavily involved with a professional organization devoted to Virtual Assistants for a few years now. I’ve done a great deal of volunteer work for that organization including giving permission to publish my articles, assisting other members with article submissions for the organization’s own publication, providing text and audio testimonials, assisting with planning virtual events, making connections with speakers for seminars, etc. I did all of those things because I believed in the values and objectives the organization’s founder proposed. I wanted to help promote what I thought was a great and noble cause - elevating our profession and giving like-minded professionals a place to freely share ideas, inspiration, successes, failures, and mutual support.

We all know that any healthy organization must change and evolve over time in order to stay current and responsive to the community it serves. That is paramount to a healthy, sustainable business. However, when the organization’s core values, beliefs, and objectives evolve to such a degree that the organization is no longer recognizable from its original roots? Unfortunately, then it’s often time for key members to disengage and move on. This is the path I have found myself on over the last year - increasingly distancing myself from an organization whose core beliefs and objectives are no longer in line with my own. I simply cannot support, nor sit idly by, while a once vibrant and open community that celebrated critical thinking and intelligent debate becomes a community of censorship driven by a single dictator who makes no room for any opinion not in line with hers.

You would think that growth would be a positive thing and that growth which causes a separation in ideals is simply healthy maturation of an organization. Separation should be dignified and professional. You simply agree that you no longer see eye to eye and the best course of action would be to part ways and wish each other the best. Unfortunately, this is not the case with this particular parting. Instead, I find myself feeling betrayed and used. In the beginning, there were specific boundaries for where the organization would and would not go in terms of growth. There were things each of us understood to be unacceptable in terms of the kind of community we all wanted to help create and foster. I have operated under that understanding since the very beginning.  I have given freely of my time and my expertise in support of that goal…only to find that I was misled. The goals we all work so diligently towards were never the “real” intended goals. What was deemed “unacceptable” in the beginning is now the status quo and the goals for the whole organization. The “community” we helped to create has become the vehicle for promoting only one.

I cannot help but feel betrayed and saddened that one person could take such advantage of all those who gave so freely of their time and effort to build a noble, elevated community - only to have that community stripped from us so that one and only one person can reap the benefit of a combined effort. That, in my opinion, is the epitome of unethical behavior. It has also been a hard, painful lesson learned in terms of volunteering the time and energy, much less the image and integrity of my business.

Have you learned a similar lesson in your business? By all means, feel free to share your experience by posting your comments below.

It’s unwise to pay too much. But it’s worse to pay too little.

When you pay too much, you lose a little money; that is all.

When you pay too little you sometimes lose everything, because the thing you bought was incapable of doing the thing it was bought to do.

The common law of business balances prohibits paying a little and getting a lot. It can’t be done.

If you deal with the lowest bidder it is well to add something for the risk you run.

And, if you do that, you will have enough to pay for something better.

There is hardly anything in the world that someone can’t make a little worse and sell a little cheaper - and people who consider price alone are this man’s lawful prey.

-John Ruskin 1819-1900

I haven’t posted an ethics-related post in quite some time. Quite honestly? I haven’t had any ethics-related inspiration for a post lately. Not until recently, that is.

There’s alot of talk in the blogosphere about monetizing blogs - making your blog earn money. Blogging to the Bank, Problogger, John Chow, etc., there are blog posts galore out there about how to turn a buck with your blog. I have to be honest…most of that stuff makes me want to gag. It sends that same ‘used car salesman in a bad suit’ shiver down my spine as alot of these ‘experts’ out there who self-proclaim to be ’industry leaders’ when they’re barely more than just a good copywriter.

Personally? I’m of the opinion that ‘monetizing’ is not something appropriate for a business blog. It has too much of an ‘ick factor’ for me. Business blogs are meant to facilitate building a relationship with potential customers and/or clients. They are a means to let those buyers-in-waiting get to know a little more about you, hopefully come to like you, and eventually trust you enough to do business with you.

However, is there a way to have a business blog ‘earn its keep,’ so to speak…without compromising those ethics? With all the information out there about passive income streams for solo professionals, is it ethical to have one of those passive income streams be earning money from your business blog? There’s a fine line between creating passive income and the icky underbelly impression of a ‘monetized’ business blog. A very fine line.

Here’s my take on the matter. (Feel free to express your take by posting your comments below.) IF…and we all know “if” is a pretty big word…if the business blogger in question adheres to a strict policy of only allowing or accepting compensation for the promotion or endorsement of products, services, or events he/she would already be willing to do for free AND they fully disclose the practice of paid reviews/endorsements/affiliations to readers, then I do not see an ethical dilemma. By maintaining a strict policy of only promoting what you truly believe in yourself and being honest about it, you give your blog readers the information they need in order to make a judgement call about why you’re recommending something to them.

I myself have developed a passive income for The Sounding Board via compensation for some of my reviews and recommendations. I disclose that information site-wide via my disclosure page so that readers may determine for themselves how much weight they want to put into what I have to say. I only accept compensation for reviews or recommendations that I would have done otherwise without any compensation.

For example, let’s say hypothetically that I use ABC Webhosting to host one of my sites. I’ve been thoroughly impressed with the service I received from ABC and want to share that with readers. I do that just because I want to share my own experience and a good resource that might be of benefit to readers. ABC offers to compensate me for posting my recommendation. Provided I let readers and visitors know that I entertain such offers, is there anything wrong or unethical in accepting the offer? I don’t think so.

On the other hand, let’s say that I’ve never done business with ABC, or even heard of them for that matter. I receive an offer for compensation in order to post a positive review of their hosting services. Hmm. That would be unethical, in my opinion. I would be blatantly lying for my own financial gain to post that I’m impressed with their service if I’ve never experienced it before.

What’s your opinion? Is one scenario a more ethical practice than the other? Are they both unethical? Do you have a similar story to share about the fine line between passive income and marketing puffery? Post your comments here or send me an email - sandi at virtually yours llc dot com.