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"There's something truly creepy about the notion of marketers manipulating what ordinary people say to one another," writes Jeff Gelles. "As a parent, I'm especially concerned when the targets are teenagers like my daughters - which is why I decided to take a look inside Tremor [5]," a Procter & Gamble [6] Web site that has enlisted a quarter-million teenagers as "word-of-mouth [7]" marketers. Tremor uses coupons, discounts, free downloads and product samples combined with "the usual online smarminess" to hook kids into spreading the word about their clients' products.
Links:
[1] http://dev.prwatch.org/users/13916/sheldon-rampton
[2] http://dev.prwatch.org/topics/marketing/guerrilla-marketing
[3] http://dev.prwatch.org/topics/children
[4] http://www.addtoany.com/share_save?linkurl=http%3A%2F%2Fdev.prwatch.org%2Fspin%2F2005%2F11%2F4141%2Fsells-teen-spirit&linkname=Sells%20Like%20Teen%20Spirit
[5] http://www.tremor.com
[6] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Procter_&_Gamble
[7] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Word_of_Mouth_Marketing_Association
[8] http://www.philly.com/mld/philly/business/columnists/jeff_gelles/13039668.htm