WebProNews

Product placement advertising - integrating products into TV programming - is the advertising rage here in US right now.

Now blog pioneer and entrepreneur Marc Canter is porting this model to the blogosphere. Beginning this week 15 independent bloggers will receive $800/month each to mention a company on their blogs. They also will receive $50 for each lead they deliver.

I am on the fence on whether this is smart strategy or not. On the one hand, the company gets to reach influentials in a very cost-effective way. On the other, I feel that it's tainted. These readers are well attuned to what's going on here and may abandon the bloggers for others where they can get similar information in a marketing-free environment. It will be fascinating to see how this works out.

Steve Rubel is a PR strategist with nearly 16 years of public relations, marketing, journalism and communications experience. He currently serves as a Senior Vice President with Edelman, the largest independent global PR firm.He authors the Micro Persuasion weblog, which tracks how blogs and participatory journalism are changing the public relations practice.