360DigitalInfluence

Our friends and trusted partners over at the Word of Mouth Marketing Association recently posted a few ethical questions on their Ethics Review Blog and asked word of mouth practitioners to weigh in. One of the questions that really struck a chord with me asked:

Is it ethical to create and maintain multiple online identities when engaging in digital of mouth of marketing?

No.  It’s not okay to maintain multiple online identities or, what I like to call: lying.  There can only be ever one of you and, by definition, multiple identities rely on some degree of intentional truth-altering distortion.  The social media highway is littered with failed WOM campaigns built on this sort of transparency-damaging deception.  Our own Blogger Outreach Code of Ethics that governs our work online spells this point of view.

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