Acronym

Devious and underhanded? Is asking people for references devious and underhanded? It feels the same to me. If I'm applying for a job, and you call my references and they say good things about me, how does the fact that I ASKED them to be my references make their testimonial inauthentic? In your hypothetical example, if there was some kind of compensation (free registration, etc.), that would be a different story and would warrant disclosure. If they DEMANDED that the bloggers use specific copy, that would be another story. But the bloggers always had the option of saying no, so I assume whatever they put up was an authentic endorsement.

Sorry, Scott, but while there is something to be said about bloggers taking compensation for expressing opinions about particular products (which is why the FTC got involved in that particular issue), I think you're WAY off in this example. In fact, I don't understand your point at all. Would you expect a reporter for a trade magazine who writes an article about an association's event to write, "Oh, by the way, they sent me a press release and the pr director called me a couple times"?

The scenario you described is just PR in its most basic and most uninteresting form. There's nothing even remotely devious about it. But that doesn't make it "smart marketing." Depending on which bloggers they approached and how they approached, it could have easily turned into BAD marketing, not because it was in any way unethical but because some bloggers get cranky when people send them emails asking them to talk about specific things and are as liable to say something nasty as helpful -- and I guess that makes them just like reporters and columnists for traditional media!

I don't know if it is devious or not, but I do like to know if the voice I am reading is the voice of the blogger and his/her own opinions or the voice of a sponsor, advertiser, best friend, etc. that the blogger is simply restating and passing off as his/her own opinion.

At minimum, reprinting someone else's suggested copy without attribution or using my own voice just sounds like sloppy blogging (or any other form of journalism). At its worst it is shilling without disclosure. How hard would it be to simply blog, "ABC Association sent me a copy of their upcoming conference schedule and asked me to blog about it. I've been an ABC ______ (disclose relationship) for years. When I reviewed the conference schedule I found several sessions and the following conference innovations particularly useful .... You can decide for yourself if the conference would meet your need by visiting this link: _____.

Some of the principles in the Word of Mouth Association's Code of Ethics might help illuminate some of the good issues Scott has posed: http://womma.org/ethics/code/

Thanks Kevin, Jamie and Jeff for your thoughtful and rapid responses. I was not saying I thought that this practice was actually completely deceitful but I do think it could be perceived that way. I think that there is a different level of disclosure that is expected by readers of different forms of social media when compared to the newspaper, local news, etc. Should it be that way? That I don't know but as I mentioned in my post authenticity is a critical piece to success in Social Media. Therefore I think it could be important for anyone contacting a blogger or tweeter or whatever to suggest that if they choose to mention the event they state that it was requested of them, and if that is not suggested the person blogging or tweeting take it on their own shoulders to state the they did receive a request asking them to mention it. It would be as easy as writing something like Jeff did in his comment.

Agree? Disagree? Let me know.

Scott

I feel like it goes back to the old adage "Would you want to see it on the front page of the New York Times?" I think the scenario Scott describes above would probably play OK--imagine an article describing how a staff person contacted the bloggers, asking them to spread the word about the conference. I don't think it would come across as deceitful.

Now, if the bloggers were offered some kind of compensation in exchange for guaranteeing that they would write positive things--free registration, like in Jamie's example in his comment--that would not come across well on the front page of the Times. (Note that I have heard of some conferences giving bloggers free access to cover the meeting just like they do for print reporters. But that's not the same thing as offering registration in exchange for positive buzz.)

I'll weigh in. Scott, I agree with other comments that the scenario does not present much of an ethical dilemma for me. As others suggested, a quid pro quo would, but I think there are other possible more subtle ethical scenarios -- such as what if the meetings person making the request could influence the education at meetings, and the bloggers being asked thought that presenting at meetings was important to them. Still, not an especially hard ethical situation for me to unpack, but grayer than a straight quid prod quo.

It seems to me like you're putting the authenticity emphasis on the wrong person. All organizations have a need to communicate their messages, and social media is just as viable an outlet as other media. The onus of authenticity falls on those engaged in social media. To be influential, you must be both interesting and authentic in the eyes of those paying attention to you. Slip up in either of those areas, you become just a noisemaker.

Note to association folks hoping to be that meeting marketing manager hoping to influence bloggers to talk about his or her meeting: think of ways they can do so that make them sound interesting and authentic.

To add to Scott B's comments about possible gray, does it make any different from an authenticity standpoint (or any other I guess) if the blogger would not have otherwise written about the meeting, or how effusive the blogger is in promoting/praising the meeting?