Sorry to go all commercial on you but this is a bit of an opportunity for some. You can now pay for your links in the left column of Tonbridge Blog by Paypal simply by clicking on the button above the Useful Links and Blogs Heading. This will take you through to a screen where you'll be asked to pay a monthly subscription and will ensure that your company or club link will always be there. Having this link will obviously allow people of Tonbridge and visitors to TBlog, and there are literally hundreds every day, to go straight through to your own site. With the absence of any local magazine (Yeah, what has happened to that Tonbridge Insider Magazine?) as things stand this could be a very useful and low cost business tool. Give it a try for 12 months and watch how it makes a difference to your organisation. There have been quite a few local businesses keen to try it without being prompted so I've decided to make it easier to subscribe. There now was that commercial enough?!..
4 comments:
"Sorry to go all commercial on you but this is a bit of an opportunity for some."
Surely you mean an opportunity for yourself, TB! Does this £20 monthly fee apply to everyone, or will it only apply to businesses? What about all the societies and voluntary organisations already listed on your blog? Will you be charging them for a link?
What about fellow bloggers like myself, who write for our own enjoyment, and to keep people informed about a particular field of interest. Will we have to pay £20 each month as well? We certainly don't blog to make money, and I've never heard of anyone charging their fellow bloggers for a link.
Let's not kid anyone by pretending it's difficullt to set up links on a blog, and once they're there, that's it, there's no further maintenance involved on anyone's part!
It doesn't seem very public spirited of you TB, especially as Blogger is a free service. I therefore await your comments with interest!
Presumably you will publish your hit rates just like other publications that charge for ads?
Tonbridge Inside has not published this year so what if you have paid for ads in advance?
But I see the Local StreetWise mag is still publishing, £25 per month if you take a 6 months ad.
Rest assured Paul Bailey that TBlog isn't going to start charging you for your beer blog. No the intention is to allow those businesses and clubs who have, over the years, approached me asking to put a link on there to have that facility. Isn't it fair that TonbridgeBlog should charge for that. There would still be standards in terms of what goes on there but at the moment there are some who wouldn't be there unless they were prepared to pay, which a few are at the moment, having approached me, not the other way around. £20 a month actually isn't alot for a highly targetted audience with a local focus reaching around 6,000 people most months and sometimes alot more than that. Why do you have a problem with making money? How do you think magazines and newspapers make most of their revenue? So long as it doesn't adversely affect the overall content and direction of the blog (if indeed it ever had any!) what's the problem?...
Thanks for your response TB, and glad to hear you won't be charging fellow bloggers like myself to be linked in on Tonbridge Blog. However, given the myriad of links to useful information on transport, councils and other public services listed on your blog, as well as all the clubs, societies and sports organisations featured, how will you decide who pays and who gets a free link?
To set the record straight I don't have a problem at all with people making money, and am well aware that newspapers make most of theirs through advertising.
Good luck to you for trying to make a few bob in these straightened times, but I can't help feeling that blogs are somehow different from websites which are more commercial in nature, and which need to attract advertising if only to cover their hosting costs.
For a start blogs are usually much more personal in character and are often written straight from the heart. People blog because they like to blog. Whether it's to get something off their chest or to get their message across to a wider audience, it's all done for the sheer love of it. All the links on my blog are to websites or blogs that I personally approve of, and which I am happy to recommend to my readers. I also know that the vast majority of fellow beer bloggers follow the same principles when it comes to deciding which links feature on their blogs.
We all know that money talks so will you be able to say the same about Tonbridge Blog when there's a financial incentive involved?
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