Comments on: Bank botches blogosphere break-in: NAB’s “spam-gate”

By: Club Troppo » Missing Link Daily

Club Troppo » Missing Link Daily — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 23:04:08 +0000

[...] sure this was covered at ML in the last few days, but Jason Wilson’s post on National Australia Bank’s spamming of blogs deserves highlighting again anyway. Unethical pricks. Lucky they’re not my bank these [...]

By: jason

jason — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 13:02:22 +0000

Thanks for the further info folks. It’s an odd tale - I’ll post again on this tomorrow.

By: Greg

Greg — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 03:28:12 +0000

Readers are invited to judge the offending comment in context for themselves.

Apart from the clumsiness and rudeness of this, what is particular “ham-fisted” is that my blog is an anti-footballer blog, focusing on all the negatives of AFL off-field behaviour (bashings, rapes, booze, drugs etc). Not a good look for the AFL (of whom NAB is a major sponsor).

This is prominently displayed throughout and it beggars belief that the “communication and brand professionals” placing the comment failed to notice how vigorously I trash the brand of their client’s partner.

Lazy, rude AND stupid!

By: Amanda

Amanda — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 02:38:58 +0000

The “FootyFan” comment at Sidelined yesterday struck me as something similar but it was borderline so I didn’t delete it. I will, if it appears to be a trend or campaign or something.

The footy is a public forum too in the sense it is open under various restrictive circumstances to the public, but if the Commonwealth tried some ambush marketing there at the expense of the official sponsor, I doubt NAB would shrug it off as a victory for free speech.

Very ham fisted.

By: jason

jason — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 07:43:20 +0000

Yeah I agree Sarah. It’s just a surprise to me that “media professionals” don’t already know that this is a no-no in the blogosphere. I hope they’re not charging too much!

By: Sarah

Sarah — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 00:23:13 +0000

Blogs are no more a forum for free advertising than newspapers are, and perhaps less so, given that many bloggers operate under a particular theme or set of principles rather than auctioning advertising or reporting space off to the highest bidder. Would Cox+Inall run around the city sticking promotional material inside the front page of every newspaper and magazine on display in newsagencies and supermarkets, or would that be seen as a kind of piracy?

I doubt there would be a single blogger to disagree that the comments facilities are designed to allow readers to express opinions relating to the post. And I doubt there’s a single blogger who enjoys being spammed. Frankly, it pisses me off and if it was a well-known company like NAB that did it to me I’d probably be motivated to write a post badmouthing them for their tactics.