You bet it is. Astroturfing, it is all over professional marketing and even more prevalent in the Public Relations industry. But should you take advantage of this online marketing practice or stay away?

For the newbies, Wikipedia defines Astroturfing as:

“…the practice of masking the sponsors of a message or organization (e.g. political, advertising, religious or public relations) to make it appear as though it originates from and is supported by grassroots participant(s)”

In the online marketing world, this is a big no-no. If a review site or search engine discovers your behavior, it can mean big trouble for your site’s traffic. That being said, I have seen very few people ever get caught or punished for using this tactic.  A few big brands are punished every year to scare everyone, but other than that I have not heard of many.  Of course, that doesn’t mean you should do it; you should not engage in the practice unless you are competing in a niche that requires it, though many do.

Recent Examples of Companies Caught Astroturfing

Here are a few instances in which large companies were penalized for astroturfing activity:

• Microsoft caught ‘astroturfing’ bloggers again to promote Internet Explorer
• Samsung fined $340,000 for astroturfing in Taiwan
  • a similar article on www.engadget.com
• Even the big Search Engine companies engage in this behavior.
  • Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo are secret backers behind European Privacy Association
• For more examples of government organizations and private companies astroturfing, see this list on Reddit.

Astroturfing has been part of politics since the beginning of time. Everyone starts as the little guy, and, just like the puffer fish, needs to make themselves appear bigger than they are in order to survive. It’s no surprise that this tactic is used online today, in order to grow business or get an edge.

There are some types of Astroturfing that are worse than others. It’s one thing to support a friend by asking all your friends to vote for them or their business, and quite another to use hundreds or thousands of fake online IDs to alter the public perception of a website or company. The latter is offered by hundreds of service providers in New York and California. Most of these enterprises use real people and pre-approved scripts to provide this service. More technical shops can offer this service using bots and programs, but if it’s done incorrectly, it can be very easy to spot. I don’t recommend using any of these services. While it can provide a quick win, it will do more harm than good  in the long run. It’s also even illegal in some cases.

In my experience, it’s usually higher end Public Relations firms that engage in Astroturfing.. This is typically done on behalf of a company or a powerful individual.  Some of these PR firms have gotten excellent at creating fake accounts and maintaining them in a natural way so it can be very hard to spot.

I don’t see much reason to engage in this type of behavior as a marketer, but there will be times when your boss asks you to find ways to clean up bad reviews or get your product/app to rank higher in a store that bases rankings on downloads or reviews. When you are asked to take on these type of challenges, I recommend the following:

• Address the bad reviews head on or leave them be. If there is a chance that this review will never rank high or have much impact, except on your boss, I suggest not responding and just creating content that can replace it in the search results.  If the review is a well-established post that will not go anywhere soon, I suggest having your smartest people respond to the issues addressed in the review in a positive and honest manner. You can also ask some of your more loyal clients/users to participate as well.
• I never recommend faking downloads or reviews just to get a better position in the app stores.

Alternatives to Astroturfing

There are better ways to go about faking downloads or reviews:

• Optimize your app page within the app store, making sure to use the appropriate keywords.
• Engage your loyal customers and fans.  Many will take the time to leave a review if you just ask them in the correct manner.
• Shame your power users (people who use the app the most) into leaving a review.  Remind them that your app is free or at least very reasonably priced and that all you are asking is for a few minutes of their time.
• Test different app categories.
• Run a paid campaign in Adwords to drive downloads.

Things To Keep in Mind:

• Don’t be spammy, if you feel sorry about it, don’t do it. Stick to “White Hat” tactics.
• Don’t just do a one sentence review. Provide a real review and make it useful.

Lying or misleading the public is never a good idea (Unless it is for the greater good, some say).  If you find yourself about to play in the Astroturfing world, ask yourself some hard questions and then do what you think is best. Good luck.

For more information on this subject, check out the Ted Talk by Sharyl Attkisson called Astroturf and manipulation of media messages.