word-of-mouth marketing

U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) chair Deborah Platt Majoras will leave her government post to work for Procter & Gamble (P&G), the largest U.S. consumer products company. Even though Majoras has excused herself from FTC matters that may impact P&G and will need to follow a year-long "cooling off" period, Multinational Monitor's Robert Weissman is concerned. "P&G is the leading company involved in 'buzz marketing,'" he writes. When Commercial Alert petitioned the FTC to investigate buzz marketing as "fundamentally fraudulent and misleading," the watchdog group cited P&G's teen buzz marketing division, "Tremor." Majoras's FTC agreed that the "assumed independence" of a buzz marketer might mislead consumers, but decided against further investigation or action. "The P&G case -- involving a quarter of a million teens who are not instructed to disclose their relationship with the company -- apparently was not noteworthy enough," Weissman concludes. An FTC ethics staffer said of Majoras's new job, "It is how things work. The nature of the business is the revolving door."

The Hotrodders.com website has launched a satirical spinoff, SpankMyMarketer.com, aimed at exposing "illegal stealth marketing" on behalf of companies including General Motors, Holley, Comp Cams and Dynomax, which they say has been posted on theirs and other auto-related websites. The first example, they write, was a "Spank My Monkey/Anti-Christ" campaign in which "Gas Monkey Garage, a fairly well-known hot rod shop," spammed websites with a "promotional photograph" that "featured the owner of Gas Monkey Garage, Richard Rawlings, posing in women's thong underwear with his shop manager," accompanied by a video in which Rawlings declared himself the "anti-Christ of the Hot Rod World." More recently, a viral marketing company called PowerTV has been posting on auto forums under usernames such as "powermelissa" who calls herself "a big-time car girl" as she posts promotional videos for clients' products.

Listen to this week's edition of the "Weekly Radio Spin," the Center for Media and Democracy's audio report on the stories behind the news. This week, we cover greenwashing the Olympics, when a Nobel prize doesn't count for much, and why human waste by any other name is still ... you know. In "Six Degrees of Spin and Fakin'," we tell you how many steps it takes to get from a corporate apologist to a perennial thorn in industry's side. The Weekly Radio Spin is freely available for personal and broadcast use. Podcasters can subscribe to the XML feed on www.prwatch.org/audio or via iTunes. If you air the Weekly Radio Spin on your radio station, please email us at editor@prwatch.org to let us know. Thanks!

Spending on word-of-mouth marketing "has increased from $76 million in 2001 to $981 million in 2006 and is expected to grow to approximately $3.7 billion by 2011," according to a report by PQ Media. Still, word-of-mouth marketing accounts for just 0.4% of the estimated $254 billion spent on all marketing services, which includes direct marketing, branded entertainment and public relations. The new report defined word-of-mouth marketing as "supported by research and technology that encourages consumers to dialogue about products and services." Word-of-mouth may be more effective than traditional advertising. Nearly 80 percent of those polled in a recent Nielsen Global Survey ranked "recommendations from consumers" as the most credible source for product information. Newspapers were ranked second-most credible.

As noted in part one of this series of four articles, Setting the Stage, in 2006, Merck captured worldwide attention with the introduction of what is often touted as the first ever vaccine against cancer. Effective against two strains of Human Papillomavirus (HPV) that account for 70% of cervical cancer cases, the vaccine shows real promise for reducing HPV infection in women.

These articles are not primarily about the efficacy of Merck's vaccine, Gardasil, or of GlaxoSmithKline's competing vaccine, Cervarix, which has not yet received FDA approval. Dr. Diane Harper, who has studied HPV for twenty years and worked on the drug trials for both vaccines, told me emphatically that "The vaccines are good and will indeed prevent cervical cancer." But Dr. Harper has serious concerns about Merck's marketing juggernaut, and the push for vaccine mandates for middle-school aged girls.

PR Week has more on McDonald's "moms' quality correspondence" PR campaign. The fast food giant met with the six mothers in early June, "at the company's global headquarters in Oak Brook, IL. Future interactions will include a visit to a beef supplier in August and a 'farm field' and produce supplier in September. ... The moms will also get the chance to work behind the counter of McDonald's in Oklahoma City." McDonald's PR executive Tara Lazarus Hayes said the mothers "will get to see first-hand how menu items are made, and ask our executives tough questions about nutrition," and also get a "sneak peek" at a "product due to launch next year." The campaign is geared to help McDonald's neutralize criticism about fast food and childhood obesity. "We're also hoping to dispel that McJob image," added Hayes. "We understand the mom-to-mom dialogue is important because they listen and influence each other." She explained that McDonald's hopes "the misperceptions they had and myths that are out there will be debunked by their [the mothers'] experience." The mothers will write about their experiences "and have them posted, unedited by McDonald's, online at McDonaldsmom.com."

In an attempt to deflect criticism that its fast food makes children fat, McDonald's is recruiting mothers as "quality correspondents" to observe and report on its operations. In a message sent to "mother-oriented social networks and freebie product sites," McDonald's is offering mothers "behind-the-scenes access to the farms [where] our fresh ingredients are grown." The winning mothers "are expected to participate in as many as three 'field trips' lasting two to three days, and receive payment for 'reasonable travel expenses,'" reports AdAge. A McDonald's spokesperson said the company will then give the mothers "avenues to be able to share their findings." According to Time magazine, McDonald's is also "lobbying dictionary publishers to change the meaning of the word McJob -- or remove it altogether -- on the grounds that it denigrates the company's employees." McJob is commonly used to refer to "an unstimulating, low-paid job with few prospects," as defined in the Oxford English Dictionary. McDonald's wants to redefine McJob as "a job that is stimulating, rewarding ... and offers skills that last a lifetime."