Shill marketing uses employees pretending to be regular customers to promote a product, often on the internet. This practice is generally considered dishonest and can lead customers to feel cheated. The anonymity of the internet makes shilling easier, with chat rooms, message boards, and blogs being common stages for shill campaigns. The setup involves asking an innocent-sounding question and having a shill answer with a glowing review. If the setup seems too perfect and the response is quick with only rave reviews, it may be a shill marketing campaign.
Someone who works for a company but pretends not to to appear as a reliable source is a shilling. Shill marketing is the act of using a shill to try to convince the public that a product is worth buying. Sometimes illegal, this practice is generally considered dishonest. If customers find out they’ve been targeted with shill marketing, they often feel cheated.
The concept of shill marketing is simple. People tend to feel more comfortable with a product or service if they know someone else who has a good experience with it. If someone not associated with the company tells you how good it is, the complaint will likely be more persuasive than if it came from the company spokesperson.
A marketing shill worker is actually employed by the company, but pretends not to be. The marketer acts like a regular customer and tries to encourage people to buy the product. Often, multiple shills work together, reinforcing each other and engaging in conversation about how great the product is.
The internet has become the place to be for shill marketing. Since the Internet is anonymous, shilling is much easier. One person can pretend to be several different customers in the same marketing shill setup. Chat rooms, message boards, and blogs are common stages for an Internet shilling campaign.
Employees engaged in a marketing shill setup register one or more accounts on an Internet service, such as a bulletin board. Usually one of the marketers will ask an innocent sounding question. “I was interested in purchasing product X. Has anyone heard of this?” This is the classic setup.
Another user, possibly the same person using a different login, will answer the first question praising the product. “Oh yeah, I started using product X a month ago and I love it. I use it all the time. It’s the best product in the whole world! ”
Marketers sometimes try to bring other message board members into the discussion, but the hook is already set. Anyone unfamiliar with setting up shill might believe the endorsement is real, and not just a cheap gimmick. Of course, not all product endorsements are shill marketing in disguise. If the setup seems too perfect and the response is quick and only offers rave reviews, it is possible that you are not seeing a real testimonial, but are moving into action.
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