

Seth Godin Tries Out Brandjacking - onreact-com
http://outspokenmedia.com/reputation-management/seth-godin-brandjacking/

======
patio11
Like GetSatisfaction, stripped to its essentials this is "I have an authority
domain and can rank for your brand name. Such a wonderful brand, would hate to
see anything happen to it. $5,000 a year is cheap to you, isn't it?"

~~~
MrMatt
I'm not sure I understand the legalities of this. What is to stop a company
listed on there from suing for trademark infringement?

~~~
patio11
If they're smart, the fact that precisely nothing would make Seth's day more
than being sued by a large corporation trying to stamp down on the little guy
trying to expose their horrible business practices.

Seth can't get his new business venture onto the front page of the NYT by
himself, after all -- he needs your legal department to make that happen. The
rest of the Fortune 500 will promptly DDOS his order takers with their credit
card numbers when that gets published. He'll also collect tens of thousands of
links, many of them from authority sites such as TechCrunch, Slashdot,
Consumerist, the newspapers which take direction from the NYT, etc etc, and as
a result rank much better for other brands than he had previously.

If they're stupid, hopefully they're not so stupid that they'll ignore the
lawyers who will say there is not even a scintilla of a case.

[Edit: Its not letting me respond because the site is worried I'm flaming you,
which is totally not my intent.

In sum, litigation is a last-resort dispute resolution mechanism which you use
to achieve business goals. Litigation here will not achieve business goals. On
a totally separate level, which is academically interesting but only that,
BigCo would be unlikely to prevail with a claim of trademark infringement.

There is no danger of confusion between Ford and Ford In Public -- it says
"unofficial", prominently. There is no cognizable commercial damage -- Seth is
not trying to sell cars. If you were a particularly bad trademark lawyer, you
might argue that someone saying bad things about your brand causes you damage,
but that cuts _against_ a finding of trademark infringement, because it tends
to demonstrate that the mark is being used, take your pick, transformatively,
for identification ("nominative use"), and for purposes of commentary.

But, again, first rule of law for programmers: law is not program code, and
litigation is not executing an algorithm. It is a negotiating tactic.]

~~~
pbhjpbhj
Looking at the site I'd say they've definitely run it past a TM and Copyright
lawyer. That site is slick as scumbags, IMO - disclaimers abound from the
trademark disclaimer front-and-centre to the "we didn't aggragate this Google
did" subtitles.

------
mseebach
Meh. Get off your high horse. Squidoo is even stressing the fact that it's
unofficial to the point where it's annoying. OK, so the author thinks it's
useless, that's a valid opinion, but that doesn't make it unethical.

It's a website that mentions other brands. So does Yelp and any other local
search service. Business and Finance Websites. Not to mention all the
[brand]sucks.com websites.

<http://www.squidoo.com/kfc-in-public> isn't anymore brand-jacking of KFC than
[http://outspokenmedia.com/reputation-management/seth-
godin-b...](http://outspokenmedia.com/reputation-management/seth-godin-
brandjacking/) is brandjacking of Seth Godin.

~~~
gamache
Brands In Public's sole purpose as a moneymaking enterprise is to convince
brandholders that paying for control of their brand's page is a good idea.

The only way to effectively do this is to make the alternative, leaving
control of the page to Squidoo, a bad idea for the brandholder.

All legality issues aside (and I don't believe there are many), either Squidoo
decides to showcase the less desirable side of a brand in hopes of getting
money, or they don't make money because the brandholders are satisfied with
the way their page looks.

It is totally different from Yelp, who collects business reviews independently
of the business owner. It is different from XXXXXsucks.com sites, which do not
offer to remove certain content for a fee. It is different from local search
sites, whose purpose is to collect as many business addresses as possible in
hope of SEO.

Just like GetSatisfaction, this is a protection racket. You pay, or you lose
something valuable -- "maybe". Without the "maybe", the operation loses its
teeth. With the "maybe", the operation loses its ethics.

~~~
mseebach
> The only way to effectively do this is to make the alternative, leaving
> control of the page to Squidoo, a bad idea for the brandholder.

If you assume evil, don't be surprised if that turn out to be the conclusion.

> this is a protection racket. You pay, or you lose something valuable

Well, _any_ sale can be spun that way, with the something valuable being the
good on sale.

What isn't demonstrated is the intent that not controlling your brands -in-
focus page is damaging, rather than the neutral option.

The premise of this product is that the discussion is already happening, and
than such a page can be somehow used to control it. That indicates that not
buying would be neutral.

Granted, I can't see what I'd use such a page for, but then again, I'm not a
brand manager.

> Just like GetSatisfaction

As I recall the GetSatisfaction debacle, they were essentially passing
themselves of as agents of the brand. This is not an issue here.

------
reedlaw
This is just like MerchantCircle, GetSatisfaction, etc. How many of these
types of sites can businesses bear before deciding enough is enough? I don't
think there's room for many more.

~~~
gamache
I wonder when fingers will be broken because an internet company thinks they
can get into the extortion business without hiring any goons. Seriously. Legal
responses are limited, and it's only a matter of time before a targeted
company decides to try Plan B because Plan A sucks.

~~~
Maro
Cool, then once I get sick of programming I can change couriers and become a
Web2.0 goon.

------
JustRick
Mr Godin clearly needs a <http://www.squidoo.com/seth-godin-in-public> to
track all of this discussion about his brand all over the web.

~~~
rictic
I found <http://www.squidoo.com/squidoo-in-public> to be delightful.

------
tsally
Honestly if you really want to create a good brand, create a useful product
and be an honest company. Seth is wrong; you can control what people say about
you. But you can't hack it with a system like this. And if your not a sleazy
corporation producing bad product, you certainly don't need something like
Public Brand.

~~~
GHFigs
_Seth is wrong; you can control what people say about you._

Would you mind explaining this?

~~~
tsally
Sure. I simply meant that having a useful product and a good company culture
will largely control what people say about you. Google is a great example. I'm
not sure what they'll be like going forward, but their record since 2000 is
pretty stellar. While not as rare as it once was, Google bashing is still
uncommon.

On the other hand, if you engage in underhanded business tactics and don't
really care about your customers, you'll have a much harder time controlling
the public opinion. Microsoft has been fighting this battle for a long time,
and sometimes the results are quite comical. See the Seinfeld/Gates commercial
for an example.

------
Tichy
Wow, I so don't see the point of Brands In Public. Is it for companies who
don't have their own web site? Because otherwise, why would you want to reply
on some third party web site, rather than on your own?

~~~
pbhjpbhj
You wouldn't, but if your brand is big enough you don't have a choice. It's
just a new way to blackmail businesses - as if you went to a corp and said
"I'm creating an advert about you that's going to show in all your Google
searches, pay me enough and I'll make it friendly, don't pay and we'll make
sure everyone hates you".

~~~
Tichy
Didn't think of the Google searches. Still, it seems only suckers would pay
up.

------
Maro
"This morning, Seth used his much respected blog..."

His blog is not much respected.

~~~
tamas
Who is this guy anyways? I saw lots of submits to his blogs on HN and other
sites, but they seemed short, shallow and uninteresting, so I figured they
were posted because Seth Godin is some kind of authority, not because they
were so good posts. But I never figured out when and how he became such an
authority.

~~~
Maro
I guess he wrote some books. Also, he has a very distinctive hairstyle.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seth_Godin>

~~~
rimantas
Some of his books are not bad actually. At least I did like „Survival is not
Enough“ and did agree with many things he says in „Permission Marketing“.

His recent activity however is not interesting at all, I quit reading his blog
long time ago: <http://rimantas.com/en/archives/2008/04/29/bye-seth/> :)

------
tjic
Quick - someone tell Seth that his brand is being crapped all over at
[sethgodin].news.ycombinator.com, but he can own the sidebar for a low low
monthly price of ...

------
tmorton
The problem here isn't the "brandjacking", it's the "curate this page" option.
As a customer, this sort of site is only useful if it's uncensored and focused
- I want to read about the Kindle DRM problems along side the fawning reviews.

Basically, "curated" pages become useless. Non-curated pages might be useful,
but I'm not going to trust a site whose business model depends on "pay us to
take down negative reviews."

This isn't an ethical issue, it's just a big gaping hole in the business
model.

------
qeorge
Viewed through the lens of a customer seeking to evaluate a vendor, an
aggregation of the social media community's feelings about said vendor could
be quite useful. What he's put together isn't that great, but the idea is
sound.

But by ransoming control of the page to the brand he's gone awry. Are we to
assume that if Allstate pays the $400/month they can censor whatever they like
on the page? If so, that destroys the value of the site completely, and it
does start to seem more like brandjacking. But more than anything, this
strikes me as a ham-fisted attempt to make the hapless Squidoo.com relevant.

Also, a lot is being made of the SEO play here, and in my opinion its much ado
about nothing. Squidoo pages haven't ranked for anything in years, as any noob
at Digital Point forums will tell you. And they shouldn't - the majority are
meaningless aggregations of unoriginal content thrown together by a user who
will never update it again, or an amateur SEO wasting their time trying to get
a free dofollow link.

------
10ren
Great opportunity, poor execution.

Big companies _are_ concerned about their image. The net does change how PR is
done, and no-one yet knows how to do it. So making that problem managable is
an important contribution. Let's be clear: for a big company, $400 pcm is a
rounding error for PR expense. The real question is whether that expense will
actually do them any good. And so we move to execution:

The info on the actual pages is not helpful. There's no way to get a sense of
"what is being said". It's almost as confusing as trying to get the info by
browsing the net. I think a solution would be something like "google
trends/news for social media". For example, amazon's PR problem isn't apparent
at all: <http://www.squidoo.com/amazon-in-public> In fact, it looks like
mostly amazon PR. For it to be taken seriously, the raw information needs to
be clear and neutral (like Google not having pay-for-placement search
results).

But the biggest problem is whether anyone will actually look at these pages,
apart from PR departments. Consumers don't use brands like that. Before you
buy a Coke, do you usually have the urge to see how their branding is going?
Possibly, bloggers/reporter will use it, and will see the PR response at the
same time, and therefore it helps disseminate the company's message.

But the problem/opportunity is real, and this suggests a startup: a google-
for-brands. The technical challenge is to work out how to extract the
relevant, valuable information; the marketing challenge is to get known (e.g.
quoted by bloggers, by news services). Then, you can work out a way to charge
for it. Perhaps like a Gallup poll; or a newswire service.

~~~
GHFigs
What Amazon PR problem?

~~~
10ren
From Seth's blog that launched brands in public:
[http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2009/09/launching-
br...](http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2009/09/launching-brands-in-
public.html)

 _Over the last few months, we've seen big brands (like Amazon and Maytag) get
caught in a twitterstorm._

------
calambrac
After looking at the actual site, the worst thing about it turns out to be the
logo. Seriously, the two squids holding tentacles is one of the most
disturbing SFW images I've seen in a while.

Anyways, I don't see anything about this that's as horribly unethical as the
picture the article is trying to paint. It's certainly not as bad as the Get
Satisfaction fiasco, where GS was doing everything short of directly claiming
to be an official support channel for companies that had no affiliation. This
is just a lame aggregation with a lamer business model. I'm more disappointed
in Seth for a lack of creativity, style, and value.

------
barredo
Google should start penalizing this kind of sites

------
robryan
No problem with an opt in model, or even an op out, but I'm guessing you can't
even opt out?

~~~
GHFigs
You can't opt out of being talked about on the internet.

------
dstorrs
There is no brandjacking here; Squidoo is very clear that they are not
affiliated with the brand.

There is no extortion here unless Seth is flat-out lying about how the site
works. He states that all of the content on the page is algorithmically
generated [1], and no human has editorial control.

The lack of editorial control also applies to the brand. Even if they pay the
$400 / month, they only get control over the left-hand column [2] and nothing
states or implies that they have the ability to take down negative comments.
In fact, it seems very clear that they _cannot_ take it down.

The main use I can see for this site is for people doing research on a
purchase--e.g., checking to see if a Canon PowerShot XS10 is a good camera for
them. Even then, I would probably go to something more focused, like
ePinions.com.

[1] "Each page collects [online content] about a brand. All of these feeds are
algorithmic... the good and the bad show up[....]"

[2] And once [Squidoo builds] the page, the left hand column belongs to you.
[...] You can publicly have your say right next to the constant stream of
information about your brand[....]"

------
trebor
Can someone explain how aggregation (for blackmail) is "value-adding" to a
business? My company considers $4,800 a year in bribes to Squidoo as evil as
an e-paparazzi goblin. No business with any internet savvy would cave to these
ransom notices, as anyone with a Google search can still turn up the "dirt"
that business paid $4,800 to bury.

Not only do I consider Seth's move unethical, but it's lame too.

~~~
adrianwaj
Personally, he's done nothing wrong. It's public, openly available information
that some people want.

If that information is tampered by the underlying company, then people will
probably want less of it. If companies want to pay Seth to put up alongside
that content, how is that bad or wrong? Isn't that just like having sponsored
links alongside Google SERPs?

Has Google 'brandjacked' IBM if it allows sponsored links next to IBM related
search lookups, especially if those links are to Dell's site? Thus if Godin
has brandjacked, then Google definitely has. Also, Google spiders IBM's
websites to get this information. The result: IBM can advertise next to Dell's
SERPs and Microsoft and others can compete with Google.

Why get angry? It's just a freakin' mashup. It's not like he's letting
competitors to cross-post on one another's listings.

If Godin starts to make money, then competitors will come.

His site is like Alltop - a commodity service, nothing special, but there's
probably only enough room in the market for 1.

People who are angry or jealous, don't get mad, get even and compete, there's
nothing so far unethical I've seen.

(edit: in fact if he really want to cause a stir, why not just let competitors
trash each other on each other's pages? So far that's not possible, and props
to him for not allowing it, I could easily see that happening in competitive
markets.)

------
Lol_Lolovici
Has anybody seen exactly how "taking control of your brand" works? It would be
interesting to know how exactly replying on the left sidebar, or whatever,
works and how it impacts the original tweet/forum/etc. I see a lot of people
are commenting here about how this is blackjacking because the company would
filter out the bad information about them and let only nice stuff show. So far
I don't see evidence of that or even how that would work so if somebody knows
please share.

The way I see it this brand site would be more interesting for the
marketing/public relations department of a company that wants to see every
discussion about them in one place and jump to the actual content where they
want to reply, and not as interesting a page for other people outside the
company.

------
scotty79
I think the idea is awesome. It's so much more convenient to go to one place
aggregating information from internet to decide whether brand is trustworthy
instead lurking around different hard to read forums to get the info yourself.

Therefore it's a good free service for customers.

It also may become good service for companies because as massive amount of
people starts using his site to get information about brands, he offers the
companies cheap way to cover up their errors for large part of their potential
customers.

Guy is a genius and Lisa Barone just doesn't get it. Being Chief Branding
Officer probably makes you angry about anything that may help customers
recognize true value of brands.

------
ulf
When you think about it, its rather surprising that this has not already
happened in a big way...

------
wheaties
Ah and here I thought online piracy was relegated to backwater communities and
such. At least he's open about how he's trying to extort money from you. I
have only two things I'd like to wave his way and they're both fingers.

------
rms
Why was Skittles.com a great idea but this is unbelievably evil? Now all of
these companies are getting a Skittles.com for free.

~~~
buugs
Because a company was trying something new with its marketing. Now you get all
this for free but if you want any control you need to pay a fee.

------
The_Lost_Hacker
Douche bag move.

~~~
GHFigs
Your comment could be improved by explaining why.

~~~
callmeed
I think the article explains it just fine. Nothing wrong with expressing
agreement with 3 words.

~~~
SapphireSun
It's wrong on HN. Substantial comments prevent the degradation of the site
culture into Reddit. Unsubstantial comments invite shallow thought and blind
agreement - both of which teach us nothing the article couldn't.

------
numbchuckskills
"Brands in Public is nothing more than a 5k a year public Google Alert" - so
true.

------
onreact-com
In case this business model actually works soon enough you get dozens of
websites wanting you to pay them for your brand.

~~~
GHFigs
That doesn't follow. The supposed blackmail value of anything a site like this
might publish diminishes the more sites try to publish it. A site will have to
actually add value instead of selling the illusion that you can truly control
what is said about you online. Whether Squidoo/Brands In Public is adding
value now is debatable, but time will tell.

------
adrianwaj
It's jump on Seth day.

