HarperCollins BlogHer Follow Up

February 9, 2007 | 1 2 min read

Following up on my recent post about HarperCollins teaming with the BlogHer women’s blog network, I received from clarifications from HarperCollins on the nature of the arrangement. As I noted, HarperCollins is sponsoring “virtual book tours,” making review copies of several books available for bloggers in the network to read and review “and participate in book title discussions on their own blogs and on BlogHer.org.”

I had also noted that BlogHer runs an ad network, and said that “it doesn’t appear as though HarperCollins will be buying ads through the network, but if that does happen, then this initiative will have crossed a line.”

It turns out that I missed the point. The whole thing is an above board ad campaign from HarperCollins with no real editorial involvement in what BlogHer members write or don’t write about the books.

HarperCollins wrote me today to say that the arrangement is purely a branded sponsorship. HarperCollins is getting to promote and advertise its books, but it’s up to the bloggers decide if they want to discuss the books. BlogHer’s editors, meanwhile, have no involvement in the tour in any way, nor do they endorse the selected titles. It was also pointed out to me that the virtual book tour will never appear on the BlogHer home page, which is reserved for editorial content, but it will be promoted in an ad. HarperCollins also stressed to me that BlogHer is very sensitive about its editorial integrity, and both sides see this feature as a branded sponsorship, rather than a stamp of editorial approval from BlogHer on HarperCollins books.

And, now that this has all been cleared up, I think it’s a pretty creative way for a publisher to build a presence in the world of blogs. I’m curious to see how successful it turns out to be.

created The Millions and is its publisher. He and his family live in New Jersey.