A few months ago, the web information company Alexa redesigned their website and since then I’ve been noticing these incredibly distasteful advertisements pitching weight loss products, wrinkle removers and suspicious get rich quick schemes. While these type of advertisments are nothing new on the internet, what stood out to me was each advertisement appears to be placed by a person who is located in the same city as myself. I captured a few screenshots seen below…
When you click on any of the ads, you’re taken to different blogs that appear to be authored by a real person who resides in your home town. Some of the blogs in question are:
mywrinklesarecured.com
dianeswrinklecure.com
daily-job-news.com
rachelrayblogs.com
If you look up any of these blogs in Google, there are numerous bloggers warning that these flogs (as Jay Weintraub calls them)are blatant scams by scum of the earth affiliate marketers (Lincoln Adams’s affectionate term for the unethical blackhat set).
There have already been a few ongoing discussions about the legality of affiliate marketers using IP2Location or hostip.info databases to translate a visitor’s IP into a physical location to make it look as if the flog is authored by someone local. Some say it’s just a blackhat trick while others such as myself realize this type dishonest endorsement from non-existent consumers is in direct violation of the FTC’s “Truth in Advertising” laws designed to protect consumers from fraud.
If you have a look at the FTC Guide Concerning Use of Testimonials in Advertising, it clearly states :
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§255.2 Consumer endorsements.
(b) Advertisements presenting endorsements by what are represented, directly or by implication, to be “actual consumers” should utilize actual consumers, in both the audio and video or clearly and conspicuously disclose that the persons in such advertisements are not actual consumers of the advertised product. |
So I have to ask myself if anybody at Alexa has ever heard of the FTC? Maybe they think it’s not their problem because the actual ads are being served through Pulse360.com which makes the following claims :
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Whether you are interested in creating a campaign for ContextTarget, LocalTarget, BehaviorTarget - or any combination of the three - it all starts here. The sign-up process is simple, and before you know it your Pulse 360 campaign will be up and running.
The company started as the new business name for the content-targeted sponsored links business, previously part of Kanoodle, which has been around since 1999. Pulse 360 is now a unit of Seevast, an operating company created by industry-recognized professionals to provide innovative Web-based marketing services. |
OK, so Pulse360.com has a technology called “LocalTarget” that evidently thumbs it’s nose at FTC guidelines by using IP translation and phony testimonials to dupe consumers into believing they are being marketed to by somebody local. It’s also strange that the whois record for Pulse360.com clearly designates Kanoodle.com, Inc. as the owner and both sites are even on the same IP address.
What do you think? Should marketers be allowed to use these deceptive practices to dupe consumers?
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It seems to me like these advertisements are in clear violation of the FTC rules. Falsely linking testimonials based on a visitor’s geography gives a false sense of reputability to a given product/organization since people will take the word of a ‘local’ as opposed to a faceless ‘national’ testimonial. That in and of itself is deplorable.
I can’t believe between the Kaboodle advertising company and a net giant company like Alexa they don;t see what is wrong with this.
Every day big companies get worse and worse because they can get away with it. It’s a sad situation.
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Only stupid Americans care about what the FTC has to say.
I agree with Adam. In advertising if you give testimonials from people who don’t exist it isn’t right. The sad part is that these companies may get fined by the FTC but they will make enough money to pay off the fines and keep on doing it. They are taking a page from the telemarketers handbook.
All I have to say is this practise is very shady indeed.
I wonder how this is going to be handled when it comes to internet marketing, as a lot of bloggers do reviews of products that they have never bought or had in their possession in order to get a commission. Some of the review are really independent; but a lot of them are not.
I think that the FTC, if it really does anything, will have more of a bark than a bite on this issue. While I do believe there could and should be more uniform disclosure with online author/vendor relationships, I have no faith whatsoever in the FTC’s ability to fairly monitor the situation, let alone police it.
As a consumer, the Internet gives me all the tools I need for a multiplicity of opinions. If a book review on a blog linked to Amazon seems too rosy, what’s to stop me from Googling a 2nd or 300th opinion?
Why do we want our government treating us all like helpless infants? Whatever happened to “Buyer Beware”? An ounce of personal responsibility is worth a pound of ham-fisted regulations.
Yes advertising should be kept under a watch. It should not be overdone and if it is done excessively then it is violation of FTC. Nice post and thanks for providing the info.
FTC is just like a the list of some rules & that is for organising all the ad business under the laws ,if the Alexa & Kooo….. are overhearing these rules so in my point of view they will face a lot of problem if it gets proved!So for me only i want to say is to just wait & watch the whole show!
i love a good rant and this is a good one about alexa ads, brilliant dave.
i am by far no expert here, but it’s not that hard to tell if somethings not right… it’s simply revolting to hear companies thinking they’re above the law just because they can… something oughta be done to teach these companies a lesson… :)
True, they can catch our location and display the ads accordingly. It is so annoying. I wish there was a way to prevent these ads from displaying.
it is a very shame ful topic for the Alexa that they could do this after all i can not believe on it because the Alexa is really really a great firm so if it would have done this then it is a black mark for it!they should realize it!
Nice to know I am not alone in finding these ads offensive! I didn’t know how these ads worked until I googled pulse 360 and found affiliatebestprograms.com and read all your comments. AT&T webmail uses Pulse 360 and I have contacted customer support several times asking how I can opt-out of their annoying, intrusive, offensive & fraudulent ads. Since I pay for my email service, I want the right to opt-out of this kind of advertising! After reading the comments from others, I am wondering if filing a complaint with the FTC would help.
To the average consumer:
So, the local ad makes you buy more? Not the price and good/bad product. Then your wife should make shopping decisions :)
Hmmm. Very interesting comments by Dave. I ran across this post while doing deep research on Kanoodle/Pluse 360. If you think this type of advertising is questionable, try PPC advertising. Be careful, however, do NOT sign up for automatic funds deposit.
Alexa has always had questionable behaviors. This really doesn’t surprise me.
–bobby
I just saw the same photos touting that the people in them are from my town. These people have been flagrantly violating the law every time a page displays since at least July. It’s October now. These businesses need to be disbanded and the people who run them put in jail.
No disrespect intended, but this is typical facile internet rhetoric. If you want to make a difference, make a call to action here and get people to actually report a complaint to the FTC or make a complaint yourself (if you haven’t already). These companies get away with this baloney because people everywhere let them get away with it. It’s consensus gentium. It’s permission by apathy.