For a fee, some blogs boost firms - The Boston Globe - Boston.com - Technology - Business

I talked about WOM (word of mouth) marketing and bzzz agents in March. My students and I had a discussion of the ethics of this, and I asked them to tell me if they had encountered it. Several students that work in bars reported on cigarette campaigns where individuals spend an evening in the bar, talking and just being like a regular person, but they are handing out packs of cigarettes while they act like a bar habitué. I think shilling is shilling. This stuff about bloggers is shilling, too, and I'd consider anyone who blogged that way to be inauthentic. For a fee, some blogs boost firms - The Boston Globe - Boston.com - Technology - Business