It was bound to happen. As "viral" marketing flowed into the so-called mainstream it was just a matter of time before the weasels went to work on phoney-ass blog postings, aliases, and emails to manufacturers' websites. It's polluted the service industry, too. The travel bizz, which I am personally close to, represents a good case in point and a cautionary tale. Here's syndicated columnist Arthur Frommer:
"How hard is it for a giant PR firm to compose and then transmit several comments about a single hotel? How difficult is it for an embittered competitor of a particular travel facility to compose and send out several digs using artificial names? And which of these user-generated sites has the staff or the time to check out the validity of every comment it receives?"
Actually, not hard at all. If you have the Marketing Gene your warning lights will flash when someone suggests the various instruments of "stealth" marketing for your new product launch. You just might be better advised to give people reasons to buy your stuff the old fashioned way. Stealth can quickly decompose into sleaze.
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