In the fall I introduced SocialSpark, a pay-per-blog marketplace that connects bloggers with financial incentives to blog about specific brands and products. An interesting business model, although clearly waist-deep in ethical issues. Although not directly related, I recently stumbled on the “Blog It, Earn It” story, which does something similar, except on a much smaller, event-specific, and transparent scope. Any and all bloggers are encouraged to blog about the upcoming SOBCon09 conference in exchange for a (significant, $200) discount on the admission price of the conference, themed “ROI of Relationships.” Entries can be made by blogging about the ways in which relationships are important to you, and in what ways they are shaping personal and business worlds. These blog posts must be submitted to the site, as well as a twitter feed, which is an interesting way of maximizing exposure to the promotion and participants’ messages, by relaying the information back out through the author’s personal blog and twitter networks. A limited number of participants will be rewarded after submissions close.

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