By: Aaron Mann

There is definitely a difference between helping brands “get the word out” or broadcast messages and engaging in a conversation. And the wide variety of marketing communication tactics lends itself to both. But ONLY within ethical guidelines.

Product reviews are especially sensitive because the value and power of word of mouth is in the implied understanding that "you are like me".  According to Edelman, "trust in a person like me" has tripled over 2 years, from 20% to 68%

Last week MobileCrunch called out, in a very big way, a PR firm for unethical (highly unethical in our opinion) social marketing tactics. Basically they had interns posing as real game reviewers, and the whole post is worth a read.  Heck, the PR firm in question even bragged about this in their marketing materials!

The Word of Mouth Marketing Association has a Code of Ethics about this stuff. We believe in it, adhere to it and helped write it… yeah, it’s that important.  The FTC is releasing revised guidelines addressing the specific need to be transparent in your relationship with a brand.  So why do firms keep taking shortcuts to brand building?  Because in the hierarchy of easy to hard, it is easy:

Fake It! Astroturfing is easy and frankly effective until you get found out.  It is a simple shortcut because posing as part of the community without disclosing you represent the brand gives you instant acceptance and easily gets content out there.  It is also wrong.

Spam: Unwanted, unsolicited and importantly adds no value. If you are transparent in who you are than your offer can come across “spammy”.  That’s why faking it is attractive.  It’s easy.  Spamming is easy too, easy to get deleted.

Value: If your message is authentic, transparent and adds value to the community then it will be accepted and embraced.  Spending time up-front understand the audience and making sure you are adding value is the key to any successful social media marketing campaign.

There are no shortcuts.  Well there are but they are unethical, fraught with danger (see MobileCrunch above) and do a serious disservice to both brand and community.

We never forget that in our engagements we are first and foremost Brand Stewards and we take that responsibility very seriously.