Marketing Food to Children and Adolescents - Federal Trade ...

Marketing Food to Children and Adolescents
ads contained hyperlinks to the food product websites, and often linked directly to promotional
features of the site, such as advergames. Some companies that advertised their food brands on
third-party websites, such as Nick.com, imported games from those sites onto their own food
product websites.
Food and beverage companies and restaurants made available to children and teens a wide
variety of free, downloadable and printable content, including coloring pages, stickers, iron-
ons, activity books, mazes, tic tac toe, and other games. These frequently, but not always,
incorporated food product branding. Free downloadable content for teens included screensavers,
wallpapers, ringtones, digital music files, and layouts for MySpace pages.
Many companies offered email newsletters. 67 Through newsletters and “kids’ clubs,”
companies kept children and teens apprised of new products and new promotional offers
available through their websites. Some beverage companies reported contacting teens by text
message to alert them to new promotions, while one packaged food company had a policy not to
engage in cell phone-based promotional or marketing activity targeting children under 12.
A few companies utilized podcasts – downloadable audio files, often similar to radio
programs – and “webisodes” – online video episodes resembling television shows – to reach
children and teens through their websites. One candy brand’s website featured weekly podcasts
of Ryan Seacrest’s American Top 40 radio show, incorporating ads for the brand spoken by Mr.
Seacrest. Another candy brand developed original content for a series of webisodes featuring
musical group the Black-Eyed Peas, in a fictional storyline relating to the candy brand. One
child-directed website for a snack cracker brand had a series of webisodes centered on the
product’s animated spokescharacters. Cereal companies also featured webisodes starring
animated spokescharacters on their product websites. 68
b. wo R d-o f-mo u T h a n d vi R a l ma R k e T i n g
Word-of-mouth and viral marketing encompass a variety of promotional techniques that aim
to increase discussion of a food product or brand among consumers, and to encourage consumers
to share branded messages with one another. Many companies reported their viral marketing
efforts together with their other online promotions, such as their company websites. These
efforts typically consisted of e-cards and “send-to-a-friend” emails children and teens could
send from food product websites that displayed product branding and, frequently, hyperlinks
back to the website; companies also provided branded instant message icons that children and
teens could use when sending messages to friends. 69 E-cards were sometimes tied to a particular
holiday or occasion, such as a birthday. One company website had “tell-a-friend” messages that
could be sent by email or instant messenger, and also provided code that could be copied onto
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