Shameless self-promotion inappropriate for a MaineBusiness.com blog

The other day I surfed over to the blog on Internet marketing written by Rich Brooks, President of Flyte New Media, and bumped into this job posting.

Interesting read - if you’re a job-seeker, that is. The rest of the business community would find it hard to glean anything useful.

It didn’t take long to find another job posting. During the same week.

Huh? I thought this was supposed to be about Internet marketing.

Funny, I’ve never read Bill Nemitz’ column in the Press Herald and found that he was on the lookout for copywriters. A column like that would never make the light of day.

Things are different at MaineBusiness.com, a title run by MaineToday.com and Blethen Maine Newspapers, according to Carl Natale, the editorial staffer who manages the site’s bloggers. I’ve spoken to Carl and he said he found nothing inappropriate with the post.

I beg to disagree. Shameless self-promotion that doesn’t add value to a site’s core readership should be out of bounds.

I was Carl’s predecessor at MaineBusiness.com, and when I ran the show, I was careful to instruct our columnists (this was back before anyone was a “blogger”) not to use their space to directly promote their business.

MaineBusiness.com’s stock in trade is its credibility. Without it, it’s just another Blogger.com (and I’d hate to see that happen).

Speaking of Blogger.com, Carl says that by the end of the month MaineBusiness.com will be rolling out a new set of blogging tools that will allow anyone to hang a shingle and roll their own blog on the site. If anyone can set up a blog about anything, that’s one way to diffuse the issue. We’ll look forward to that.

One Response to “Shameless self-promotion inappropriate for a MaineBusiness.com blog”

  1. Pemaquid Crunch: Web Design notes from Portland, Maine » Blog Archive » MaineBusiness.com opens up site to all who want to blog Says:

    […] Wow, that didn’t take long! A few days after we posted a message about how only certain folks could post their thoughts - or job postings - on MaineBusiness.com, the MaineToday.com property has retooled and opened things up so that anyone can set up their blogging shop. […]

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