“Danish mother seeking” by “KarenDK26″ – what about ethics here?

Posted by Anders Colding-Jørgensen on september 13, 2009 under Marketing, Psykologi | Read the First Comment

Jonas from Mindjumpers hits the issues spot on in this post, when he asks if the ends of this campaing justify the means? Will this campaign be accepteded if a company is behind it? This kind of Social Media Marketing is about companies going under cover and in this case using deception. But are there any new ethical issues at play here?

Lots of people have shown “Karen” their love and respect on YouTube – and not any cause can emerge and claim responsibility for this campagin and profit from it. A purely commercial organisation will most likely recieve some blame for the deception used – but cleverly handled, the blame can be turned in to some branding value. But that can back fire. So if the video is purely commercial, chances are that the people behind could be discussing wether to come forward at all! That would actually be really cool (if you prefer mysteries to marketing) but that would also put pressure from the press on the young actor to tell who hired her. Not a very stable situation.

Alternatively (hello – are you reading this?) they could call up a charity organization with a related cause and ask if they want “to adopt” the video. If a non-profit organisation is promoting an important cause – e.g. related to condoms or children, the public would probably be more forgiving. But none of the organisations that have been mentioned until now have seemed likely yet.

There is a third option: The only one who have profited from this until now is the actor, Ditte. She has been “discovered” by the press – but wasn’t that really only a matter of hours?! She’s actually on Facebook! So if this her work, I would like to congratulate her (As Daniel from Nodes does). She is a really sweet girl and if she makes a video where se tells everyone that she is an actor and that she is very sorry that  she lied – that could be a viral semi-hit too.

Is online guerilla marketing, like this video, just another marketing message like we see them in any media – old or new? Or should we re-think our ethics as media change and the commercial can invade the social space with increasing speed, scale and aggression?

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