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Publishing
a website can be a lot cheaper than making a TV advertisement. That's
why so many food companies now use the internet to interest young
people in their food brands. They use flashy animation to make products
look really cool, even if the products are just sugary water or
fatty snacks. It's amazing what a bit of animation will do to make
products look good!
Company
websites are designed to be especially interesting to young people
with games, prizes and link-ups to popstars and sports stars. Some
of the websites offer gifts, downloadable screensavers, games, software
or mobile phone ringtones.
You can't
get access to some websites unless you've bought a particular food
product. For these, people have to enter a code from a product wrapper,
to gain access to exclusive parts of the company's website. Why
do they do this? To make you buy their food and try it. They hope
that you'll keep going back for more, even when the website has
changed.
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The
last Star Wars film illustrates how companies like to link
their food brands with popular films. The food companies hope
that their products will look exciting and interesting to young
people.
In
this example, a sweets manufacturer hooked up with the company
that promotes Star Wars. For this website, users had to
buy sweets to be able to get a code number from the packet to
find out if they had won a Star Wars prize.
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Young
people often visit these websites on their own, or when they're
with friends, so there isn't anyone around to explain if the marketing
is misleading, or gives an unfair message about the quality of the
products. So if a food company that sells unhealthy food tells young
people on a website that its food is healthy, who's going to stop
them? Sadly, the answer is: Nobody.
Perhaps
the biggest benefit for food companies is that no-one can complain
about internet marketing (unless a company is doing something illegal).
In the UK, the Advertising Standards Authority is the organisation
you can complain to about TV advertising or ads in magazines. But
they refuse to control websites.
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One
website promoting lollies encourages you to eat lollies because they
are 'good for you'. The website claims that vitamin C (some of the
lollies contained added vitamin C) can: prevent
and treat the common cold; fight bacteria and viruses; help speed
up the healing of cuts and grazes and help to maintain healthy blood
vessels. Most of these claims would not be allowed if they
appeared in a magazine or television advertisement. But on the internet,
companies are not controlled. Beware of what you read! |
When the Food
Commission undertook a survey of food marketing on the internet, in June
2005, it found that most food marketing websites aimed at young people
are for foods such as sweets, lollies, sugary fizzy drinks, burgers and
chips. No surprise there. But what chance do healthier foods have of getting
any attention when the focus is on the unhealthy ones?
Here is a list
of the techniques used on websites to target young people with marketing
messages relating to less healthy food brands:
- E-cards:
electronic postcards that you can send to your friends by email.
The cards often display images and logos of products and act as adverts.
- Surveys:
these are posted on many websites and ask for personal information of
the user, such as their name and address.
- Registration: many websites require a young person
to register before being allowed into exclusive areas of the website.
It also means that the company can get your email address so that they
can carry on marketing to you.
- Recommendations: Users are encouraged to recommend
the website to their friends. By telling a friend about the site, collectable
points may be awarded to the user, who can then spend them within the
website.
- Buddy Icons: downloadable icons used on MSN Messenger
(an online chat service). Some are designed by companies to advertise
at you while you chat.
- Downloadable ring tones: nine out of UK secondary school
children own a mobile phone. Many websites offer free ringtones, sometimes
accessible only with a code from a product wrapper. One burger company
even gives away free ringtones of its own advertising theme tune. They
want you to advertise to yourself every time you get a call from your
friend!
- Downloadable software and online games: young people
are also encouraged to purchase products in order to obtain a code that
can be used to download software or play games. Some of the codes can
only be used once, so you have to keep on buying products in order to
get your 'free' gifts.
- Screensavers
and wallpapers: Users can download screen-savers and wallpaper for
their computers. These often have marketing messages built in, to make
sure that you advertise the product to yourself every time you turn
on your computer!
Click
here to download activity sheets on the subject of food marketing.
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