Advertising: The Dark Side of Chess Blogging?

In this blog, I will be going over the use of advertising, especially affiliate links in blogs on Lichess. (This is not about advertising or affiliate marketing in general, but just on Lichess blogs.)
First, we will examine what they are, then their pros and cons, and finally whether or not they are ethical and fair. I hope you find it helpful!

What are Affiliate Links?

We've all seen something like this in a Lichess blog:
"Use link https://chessmood.com/?r=ebkchess to get 20% off Chessmood!"
Or "Find a FREE GM Masterclass here."
These are generally affiliate links. Affiliate links are links where a creator or influencer gets a unique link specific to them, to go to a website. If someone clicks on an affiliate link and purchases something, the owner of the affiliate link gets a commission.
In this article I will also refer to instances where Lichess bloggers promote their own course or website, such as when GM's Noel Struder, Avetik Grigoryan, and Hovhannes Gabuzyan promote their own websites and courses.

Disadvantages of Advertising

Affiliate links and promotions have many disadvantages, including the following:

1. Interrupting Focus

When you are trying to read a blog and you are constantly bombarded by someone trying to sell you something, it is incredibly distracting. Not only can you not focus on the content of the blog, but you probably will also not listen to the contents either.

2. Influences Content of Blogs

If a blogger writes about chess history, or a tournament, it is hard to include links about a course, since they have nothing to do with the subject. However, if they write about chess improvement, or a certain aspect of it, it is easy to include many links to courses about a similar subject. This can unfortunately influence a blogger to not write about subjects that people would be interested in, since it would not be profitable.

3. Can Manipulate

As I will get into more in the section of the blog where I talk about whether advertising on Lichess blogs is ethical or not, some links are misrepresenting the truth or trying to manipulate susceptible readers, especially children. It is one thing to say: "here is a great course on tactics" and quite another to say, "Brilliant course 100% GUARANTEED to get your rating over 2000!!"

These are not the only disadvantages to advertising or promoting a product on Lichess blogs, but these were the primary ones.

Advantages of Advertising

While the advantages of promoting a product in a Lichess blog is less evident than the disadvantages, they do exist! Here are the top ones:

1. Creation of Blogs

Let's face it: time is money. If someone writes a blog on Lichess without ever promoting a team, a course, a Substack, a Patreon, etc. They are volunteering their time. However, we all have costs to face and things we want to achieve. While some bloggers, for example @QueenRosieMary, @Marohzevich or @juancruzariasTDF never mentions anything as in an advertising sense, often these same bloggers have relatively fewer blogs-in her instance, @Marohzevich has 2, while @QueenRosieMary has 4. Even these bloggers often are benefit by more visits to their profile, for instance @juancruzariasTDF is also a coach. The reason that these bloggers generally have fewer blogs is that writing blogs (as all my fellow blog writers can testify) is a ton of work. While promoting a product with an affiliate link might make us a fraction of what we can earn with a regular job, it still is compensation for your work. My point in all of this is that if no one was allowed to promote chess websites or courses on Lichess blogs, I doubt many of our blogs would exist! Bloggers such as @Avetik_ChessMood and @Gabuzyan_ChessMood are promoting their website, while @TheOnoZone or @NikhilDixit are trying to make a living with chess coaching and affiliate links! However, while they may write for their own gain, they also create free value for readers, even if they don't buy anything, which is overall good for Lichess and its users.

2. Finding Good Products

While no one really enjoys having to spend money, often to get better at something or learn something it can be a huge help. If a creator whom you trust tells you about a course, website, or product, it would be wrong to assume they just say it because of the money. Hopefully (as I will mention later in the blog), you trust that they are promoting the course or product because they actually think it is valuable for your chess improvement.

3. Supports Bloggers

Similar to point 1, for bloggers to be able to continue to put out valuable content, if they have a small stream of income coming in from affiliate links, or are finding students through their blogs, it can help them to keep creating value for Lichess users. A majority of bloggers do use advertising to be able to support themselves to a level.

Is Advertising in a Lichess Blog Ethical??

I would say 90% of the time, on Lichess, yes.
In general, promoting a product and trying to make a small amount of money can be acceptable. However, there is a way to do it in methods I would consider unwise at the minimum or unethical at the worst. These are as follow:

1. Repeating it way too many times

Trying to pressure the reader by repeating the same thing 10 times in a blog is definitely not the way to go, and everyone will hate your blog if you do.

2. Making unkeepable promises

However incredible a product is, there is no "Magic Button" in chess. While there are better resources and then there are not so great resources, but to no course or book can you say things like "100% guaranteed to get you over 2000" or something along the like. Not only are you trying to manipulate your readers, but it's also simply a lie.

3. Promoting something you would never purchase

If you are a chess coach and you play video games during your chess lessons, you should not promote them! If there is a course you could promote that you know is close to worthless, don't promote it! An example: promoting a course about calculation is usually good, but if you try to sell someone a course about "The 10 trickiest openings to win in 12 moves!!!" then you are all but scamming them.

Promote only something that you actually find valuable.

Conclusion

Advertising a product in a Lichess blog can be OK to a certain extent. While it is very important to follow Lichess ToS, you should be fine if you create value and are restrained. If you see a blog creator who promotes something, don't always assume the worst-the creator might not have bad intentions. However, always investigate anything before you purchase it and don't believe everything you're told. While I myself will continue to use affiliate links, I think it is very important to use them wisely, not center your blogs around them, and to keep creating value your first priority, not making money.
Tell me what you think in the comments!
Cheers!