Marketers, forgedabout planting memes

After noticing how his posting on del.icio.us about Gmail's testing of ATOM feeds had a positive impact on his blog traffic, Steve Rubel suggests how social bookmarking tools could be used by marketers:

Now imagine that instead of sharing a blog link I had used del.icio.us to spread word in the influencer community about a new gadget I was pitching. Rather than offering a reporter an exclusive or running an ad, I instead elected to plant a mini meme. Sound far fetched? Not to me. Right now this tactic holds potential, but perhaps at some point it will lose its punch as these sites become a haven for bookmark spam. Enjoy it while you can.

• using del.icio.us to create buzz about a product is not about "sharing a link," it's a disguised form of pitching.


• it's concealed pitching, because nobody knows that the person "sharing" the link is a person hired to do so.


• it's unethical, because the person doing the "pitch" it's not honest and accurate about his/her intentions, role, and sponsor (see the PRSA Code of Ethics).


• it will breed suspicion about what we're finding on the Web and fuel anger toward the companies and people using this kind of deceiving technique. It's a lose-lose-lose deal.