As internet usage has increased over the past decade, it has also become a useful media tool for advertisers and in public relations efforts. It is an alternate, but increasingly popular way to gain publicity and create an image for a person or a company.
The retail giant, Wal-Mart, has put this new explosion of blogging to use in order to improve their image and increase positive publicity. According to Michael Barabaro, "Wal-Mart is increasingly looking beyond the mainstream media and working directly with bloggers, feeding them exclusive nuggets of news, suggesting topics for postings and even inviting them to visit its corporate headquarters". While this is definately a new form of public relations that could prove to be successful, is it ethical?
According to the Wal-mart public relations firm, Edelman, they do not pay the bloggers to do this, they only encourage it. The main purpose of this is to improve their tainted image because people are more likely to listen to other bloggers that they are familiar with than a company that has continued to do sketchy things that hurt its image. Wal-mart representatives send the bloggers positive information about the company, such as increasing job opportunities and health benefits, and in turn, bloggers post this information on various blog sites in their own words to try to get other people to see the good side of Wal-Mart and what they are doing to improve company issues, which have been criticized for some time.
While some are against this because a blog is supposed to be a person's own ideas and opinions rather than something being fed to them, this is a creative way of improving the company's image, and as long as it does not create an uproar from the public, they will most likely continue to use bloggers to their advantage.
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