It was announced today on Techcrunch, and also on Scoble’s own blog that he would be leaving FastCompany as a full-time employee. A big part of the reason is that Seagate opted not to renew their sponsorship. Scoble says he will stay on as an advisor to FastCompany.

Is anyone really surprised by this? Now, first off, I’m not trying to pick on Scoble. I think he’s a talented blogger. But seriously, let’s look at the scenario. First, we’re deep in a recession, people are being laid off and companies are hacking whole limbs off their marketing budgets.

FastCompany TV has been on life support for the past couple of months. They laid off producer Rocky Barbanica, and since then Scoble has been limping through production shooting with a $200 Flip camera. Hardly, the tools for a million dollar show.

It is rumored that Seagate’s sponsorship was in the ballpark of a million dollars per year. A million dollars per year! Ok, so what did they get for that? As far as I can tell, they got a banner on Scobleizer.com and FastCompany.tv. They also got a small graphic in the lower third of the video for the first 5 seconds of each show. Nice, sure, but worth a million dollars?

What did Seagate really get out of that deal? Brand recognition? Maybe, but when you think about buying hard drives, are you that loyal to a particular brand? If not, you’ll buy the cheapest model. If yes, then you don’t need Robert Scoble to tell you which brand you prefer. At the end of the day this really isn’t a rant about whether branding campaigns work. They do. But in this economy can a company like Seagate justify spending a million dollars a year on a show like FastCompany TV without any real success metrics?

You see where this is going right? MediaTrust is a performance marketing company. We make our living by getting proven results for our clients. If we don’t, we don’t get paid. Sure, I’ll admit, as a content creator and a publisher, I love the security and assuredness (in the short term) that a CPM model gives me. I know that if my show gets a million views, then I will make x amount of money. But does the advertiser really get their money’s worth in this economy under that model?

What if Seagate went to Scoble and said, “Hey Robert, we want to continue to work together, but we need you to show some real ROI on our investment.” They could assign you a unique URL to track sales through Scoble’s show and blog. Maybe it’s something like www.ScobleLovesSeagate.com. That URL resolves through a unique affiliate ID and he gets credit for those sales. Let’s say his payout is $10 per sale – he may end up selling so many Seagate products that he would blow that million dollar sponsorship out of the water. And you know what, Seagate would be thrilled to pay him for that because it means that for every $10 they spent, they made $20.

That is the new wave of accountable marketing my friends.

Mevio (formerly PodShow) is using a model like that. They get paid for (and pay their producers) based on performance. Adam Curry says it’s working really well.

I would love to hear from those in the online content space. Are you still getting lucrative CPM deals or are more companies approaching you offering CPA? Maybe it’s a hybrid of both? Leave your comments below.