The Perils of Paying for PageViews

Mark Glaser has a thoughtful post over on the MediaShift blog explaining why he thinks it's a bad idea to pay bloggers based on the raw page views for their posts. That's a system that appears to have been adopted by Blogmeister Nick Denton, who makes it clear that he wants big raw numbers for the Gawker Media blogs he backs - or else.

Glaser argues, however, that going after the raw page view numbers may be a poor strategy for attracting both readers and advertisers:

I believe that a blog with 50,000 loyal, repeat visitors is much more valuable to the publisher, advertisers — everyone on the business side — than a blog that has sensational posts that bring in 100,000 one-time visitors for entertainment snacks who are then gone the next moment. You hear everyone talking about the Long Tail, the ability to serve niches online, and the importance of audience engagement and time spent on a site more than sheer page views and traffic per month.

There's more, and there's a lot of thoughtful discussion in the comments as well - definitely worth your time to read and to ponder. I think his point is a valid one - and of particular interest, as we all struggle with defining meaningful measurement for our online products.