Dr. Pepper Tries New Astroturf Method

glh writes "Blogging continues to make its way into corporate America. Dr. Pepper is now blogging to build a community around their new dairy based Raging Cow product by using "key influence bloggers". The key influence bloggers are currently made up of six people mostly in their late teens/early twenties who get promo merchandise as their only form of compensation. In return, they get to "advertise however they want" through their blog. Seems like this experiment could turn into the next "big thing" in advertising-- assuming people are willing to sell out their blog space. Bloggers beware!"

Comments

Re:Sheesh

[Enzondio]

Actually Pepsi doesn't own Dr. Pepper. They are in fact owned by Cadbury (and by Coca-Cola in the UK).

Pepsi does bottle and distribute Dr. Pepper in the states, however.

As this article suggests, you are not the only one with this misconception.

Re:Sheesh

[japhmi]

Actually Dr Pepper is owned by the Dr Pepper/Seven-Up Company, which is owned by Cadbury Schweppes. Pepsi is only one of several bottlers and distributors of Dr Pepper in the US.

Re:Where do I sign up?

[Asprin]

And this is almost symbiotic and worthwhile. If you *really* like a product, I don't see why it would be anything but worthwhile to everybody accept compensation for endorsing it.

And life just gets more and more like TV: Now, I have to consider whether my family/friends/coworkers are "gettin' paid" before I take them up on that recommendation to see "Master Of Disguise II".

Thanks, but no thanks. I like to think that my wife's-best-friend's movie recommendations suck because she has bad taste.

Re:Switch!

[dcuny]

How many free cases is that post worth?

I hate to mention this (because it makes this post Grammar Police posting instead of merely -1 Still Not Funny), but here goes:

The Rule About It's and Its

• It's is only used as a replacement for "it is".
• The posessive is "its".

Unfortunately, application of this rule guarantees that your sentences look wrong.

Oh, yes: for creamy sugary smoothness, I rely on A&W Cream Soda. But who wants to drink what the Grammar Police drink?

Re:Advertising: Nothing new

[Anonymous Coward]

Not posting as my username, as a significant portion of my livelihood is due directly to ClearChannel, but I totally agree. They have a monopoly on radio and concerts across the country. They've done it through consolidation, buying up every radio station and concert promoter in the country. It wasn't really any different a few years ago though, ClearChannel just added radio stations to the mix. They're also generally good to artists (payola, concert revenues, etc) and are willing to do anything that sells, not just promote the latest act. Can't really fault them for that, they're in the business to make money.

Re:Where do I sign up?

[Schnapple]

Had one like that. Friend of mine from college who I even lived with at one point came over to visit. The Wife is out of town and he's just hanging out until he meets someone else. So at one point he asks if he can show me a video - saying that he's going to show this tape to the person he's meeting and if that meeting falls through then at least he can still write the trip off as a business expense. Seems odd, but okay - this guy was always a little off anyway.

The video is for QuikStar (sp?), which is this deal where you start your own web business selling things like soap and toilet paper. Or something. At this point I of course realized I was being pseudo-scammed.

Since this guy was a friend and it was my house, it's not like I could leave. So I sat there and asked him why I would buy soap and toilet paper online instead of Wal-Mart and he had some sorta valid reasonings (like bulk) but I really don't want to plan out my soap buying that far in advance. When I asked him how it is that so many online businesses could succeed against each other (see Herbalife) he kept diverting the question.

I basically let the conversation die without giving him a yes or no answer as to whether this would be something I'd want to do. A friend of mine got into it with him (the contact he was in town to meet, I think) and shortly thereafter was doing everything in his power to get out of it.

Ironically, Quikstar is associated with Amway.

Semi-existence of Bryon

[3ryon]

I don't know if any of you remember my site but I was one of the original bloggers. Anyway, sometime in ~1996 Intel took notice of my site and decided to make me a "beta user" of their new web cam. They asked nothing in return, but it was obvious that they were hoping to get a mention on my page (it was pretty popular...about 5,000 readers at its peak...remember this was the mid-90's). So, what I'm saying is that this is nothing new.

How many ways has Clear Channel reached you today?

[Animats]

That's the Clear Channel slogan. "How many ways has Clear Channel reached you today?". Really.

Then again, they just reported a loss of $16 billion for the last 9 months. They may be overextended.