There are lots of bloggers looking into the possibility of joining blog
networks these days so here are a few pros and cons about joinging blog networks for bloggers to consider.
Possible Pros:
Income potential: Salaried, fixed freelance payment or based on a
percentage of ad revenues. A salaried or freelance blogging job is
likely to pay more than one based on a percentage of ad revenues.
Increase in traffic from the network should result in a higher readership
for the blogger.
Tech support for improving blog design, graphics and programming.
The blogger might be able to use the traffic from the blog network blog to increase traffic to one of their own personal blogs.
Easy for the blogger to find guest bloggers from within the network to cover for them if they are sick, vacationing, etc.
Possibility for the blogger to become well-known which could lead to other
income possibilities such as a book deal (there have been a few of
these) or other blogging jobs.
Possible Cons:
Blogger may lose electronic, print, film rights, etc (depending on the terms).
Blogger may not have ownership of the blog or the blog domain name.
Advertising and revenue opportunities are controlled by the blog network.
Blogger has to follow the rules of the network.
Blogger might be stuck writing about the same subject matter
for a lengthy amount of time (blogger burnout).
There could be situations where a blog network has a blog that
is doing very well so the blog network decides to branch out and launch
another blog on the same subject. Or they hire additional bloggers for
this particular blog. In both cases this might be good for the blog network
but it could be bad for the individual blogger because his or her revenues
might be diminished (depending on the payment terms) as they are spread around
multiple bloggers.
The individual blog or the whole network could be sold.
The blog publisher could fold leaving the blogger blogless.
Blog networks are structured in many different ways so all of these
pros and cons don't necessarily apply to every single blog network.
More posts about joining blog networks can be found here,
here, here, here and here.
