How Much Are You Worth To an Online Lead-Gen Site?

jfruh writes "You may remember the tale of the blogger who found that an infographic he'd put on his site was the front end of an SEO spam job. Well, he's since followed the money to figure out just who's behind this maneuver: the for-profit college industry. He discovered that the contact info of someone who expresses interest in online degree programs can be worth up to $250 to an industry with a particularly sleazy reputation."

Re:And...

[Anonymous Coward]

"Real" universities are just as sleazy and dishonest. They are like real estate, all about looks and first impressions. Don't dig too deep!

Re:And...

[sunderland56]

Physics is a pure science. Driving is an applied science. Schools teach one or the other; few people are good at both.

Having a doctorate degree in one field - say medicine - doesn't make you smart at another - such as math, or physics.

Re:College sleaze

[crazyjj]

I hope MOOCs will kill off all these "colleges" that are more reliable producers of debt than education.

That describes pretty much *all* colleges/universities now.

Re:And...

[Farmer Pete]

Well, I can't control what companies do, but I can advise people not to make dumb decisions. Too often people are directed to pick a career that is what they want to do. Sounds great on paper. I remember filling out one of those career direction tests in high school. If I had followed it's advice, I'd be sitting in a tower watching for forest fires. I don’t have any idea what that type of a job pays, but I have to believe the market is incredibly small. I have a cousin who was half way through college studying to be a photojournalist. He wanted to take pictures for National Geographic. It wasn’t until someone finally banged into his head that there are only a couple hundred people in the world who do that job. He had better odds of getting into the NFL. It seems harsh to smash someone’s dreams, but people need to have a sense of realism in their career choices.