Is there no end to the faux pas that corporate communications folk and interactive marketing and PR agencies make in the blogosphere?

Hot on the heels of the Wal-Mart Edelman flog fiasco comes the  admission that alliwantforxmasisapsp.com is a fake blog put up by sony and their agency Zipatonia. It’s no wonder that corporate executives in the US and the UK polled for the Bulldog Reporter/Peppercom business blog survey said blogs are not a credible source of information – with corporate shenanigans like this the public will soon feel that way too.

They have obviously not read all the data that clearly shows consumers want openess, honesty, transparency and authenticity.   It builds brand and engenders customer loyalty.

A commenter on the blog claiming to be a Zipatoni executive replied to criticism in the fake blog’s comments. “Please know that we approached the client initially with this scenario and they said ‘who cares if people find out? As long as it is funny, we do this stuff all of the time,”

And you guys thought that would be all right then?  If the substance hits the fan, we’ll duck and point fingers at the client.

It’s the job of an agency to advise the client on how to operate in the new social media environment.   Not to take their money and run when the project goes south.

Social media is a new playing field with new rules.  Ignore them at your peril.

“The blog world is a very open, self-policing and pretty unforgiving world when you try to trick them with things like this,” commented Cymfony’s Jim Naill. “I don’t understand why marketers, after all the different examples of this, don’t get the message that you can’t get away with faking these kinds of blogs.”