Are you an ethical webmaster?

[ozadin]

I would say I'm an ethical webmaster. I try to write content for humans, and not computers, I don't spin content, and I put effort into my articles. Rarely, I will include an affiliate link to a product, but sometimes, I will dedicate an article just for the affiliate link. If it's dog cages, I would write an article about it, and include a link, but I have only done that once so far. I don't use any blackhat methods, and I try to obey their TOS.

 

[jean]

I have always followed my instincts while operating my online business. Now that I have a good product to sell, and I have a good affordable price for it, and as I give good customer support, I believe my online work follows a good guidelines pattern. There are no set rules that I follow generally, but if I get across a customer who is keen on making life difficult despite giving every help, then it irks me a lot. I will then take advice from my business friends and also from a lawyer friend (sometimes when absolutely necessary), and find ways to get out of the situation without getting me or my customer into more troubles later on. You may call this tactic a little out of the way, but it helps run the online business.

If one must run a business, online business especially, then there are no hard and fast set rules. Your business comes first, and when you're giving a good product and service, or even running a forum or a site, then you must be able to handle all situations.

Of course, you will find a lot of visitors, members, and potential customers, and even customers who have a scam in mind, and they will try to harm your business. At that point, you're supposed to take hard decisions to save your business and its reputation at 'all costs'.

 

[isp]

I also put free quality information before putting out any other things that aren`t free.

 

[wasi90lk]

I believe I am an ethical webmaster, I will never promote a product that is 100% scam.

The key to being a successful webmaster is to have good relations with your followers/subscribers/members.

 

[Guru]

I always use white hat techniques when promoting my sites and doing SEO. Being black hat and unethical gives you a bad reputation and can harm your sites rankings. I'd feel wrong being unethical and misleading people.

 

[Kristy]

I'm ethical. My reputation means more to me than making an easy buck. I never promote anything unless I've actually made money from it (or gotten a prize, whatever the case may be, etc.) and by that I mean actually received it in person or it's in my paypal or bank account. I've noticed a lot people will say "I've made XXX amount on this site." but then the screen shots they show will just be from that particular website and they probably mean well but if you haven't actually received that money yet and you can't spend it, then you haven't really earned it yet.

I post product reviews sometimes but if it's something I've been paid to post about I always have a disclaimer saying so. And any time I've ever promoted my blog I never used any "black hat" methods or anything like that.

 

[Murray]

The idea of creating a revenue stream of product advertising is pretty simple. You have a product that you promote and when people buy it you get paid. Do you know if these people are in debt? Do you know their specific situations? Do you know if they are hoarders and just push it into a pile because of another emotional issue? No.

The only thing you can do as a web presence is to say "I have a widgit and it does things that a widgit should do."

That's as far as your burden of the consumer goes. I think you're fine until you say "Here's a $1,000 widgit and hell I don't know if it Widgits things or not, but buy it." At that point, you're just trying to create a cash flow to yourself on things you don't even know about.

I believe that everyone on this site will be ethical because they are researching and trying to figure out how best to satisify a customer. Past that, there's nothing to be done.

 

[sam]

For me, being an ethical webmaster means always watching out for my blog readers to ensure that I don't recommend a product unless I think it's in their best interest. Though I want to earn money from my blog, I don't make random recommendations just to earn an easy dollar. That includes ad space sold for products or affiliate product recommendations.

Keeping my reader's trust is most important. That's another reason i don't sell tweets. I don't want my readers to be burdened with spam ads.

What's your own personal definition of being an ethical webmaster or blogger?

I totally agree with you! I think trust is the most important factor in a relationship. And as webmasters we are all building a relationship with our audience. I would never recommend something that I didn't find useful myself. It's better to stick to products and services that work well and tell people about them. This way they will also find them useful and you will gain their trust which means they might use your affiliate links or buy your products in the future.