Bloggers beware: Transparency is now the law.
October 27th, 2009 by Carolyn Parrs & Irv Weinberg , Mind Over Markets
One of the Ten Commandments of Green Marketing we preach is “Thou Shall Be Transparent.” Now it seems that is a Golden Rule for the United States Federal Trade Commission (FTC) too. They have just issued a ruling, according to Chris Brogan, a social media guru I follow, that basically says , “If you get something and decide to write about it, you have to disclose that it was given to you and/or whether you were paid for the review.”
The reason for this is simple. It’s the FTC’s job to make sure advertisers (and now bloggers, podcasters, etc.) are telling the truth. More specifically in this case, it prevents people from masquerading as being independent when they are not.
So much communication is floating around the airwaves today that it is vital to be able to tell news from commentary, paid opinion from fact. All of us support free airwaves and the free flow of information, but along with that goes a responsibility for transparency. It’s not that any view should be regulated in any way, it’s that these views should be presented with clear authorship and clear lineage. If it’s opinion, we should know whose opinion it is and if it’s paid advertising, it should be presented as such (think health care debate).
I believe this rule should go doubly for the marketers of green products and services. But sadly last year alone, of 1,753 environmental claims reviewed, researchers found all but one made claims that are either false or misleading. (Source: State of Green Business 2008).
Now that green is getting some real traction, it’s more important than ever to keep it real. Because if you don’t, you’ll see, especially in this passionate market, green eyes are watching. Just look what they did to poor Kermit.
October 27th, 2009 at 6:49 pm
Transparency is definitely critical. Unfortunately, too many bloggers feel that they must be perfect, so they are reluctant to be completely transparent. Hopefully, most will understand that their imperfections are what make them human, real and worth reading.
Carolyn: Right on, Gladys. That’s what makes blogs and podcasts so juicy. It’s real.
November 2nd, 2009 at 10:26 pm
It’s true, transparency is fundamental to doing business today. Consumers are intelligent and they have lots of resources available to them to help them make buying decisions that are based on more than simple product claims.
Successful companies will need to operate with transparency, and in turn this will create the need to generate real and substantial “content”. In other words, what is your company really up to, and is it meaningful beyond a simple marketing message.