In recent years, we have heard a lot about “fake news” and its effects on society. Fake news is a phenomenon that has existed since human beings began to communicate; the problem is that, with the Internet, this fake news has reached a frightening level of diffusion, on a global scale, given the current ease of transmission.
Fake news Using Fake News in Content Marketing consists of inventing striking news of facts that
Have not happened and will not happen in the future… and publishing them. The intention is generally to attract the audience to increase sales for example, but they are also used to purely and simply manipulate the public who reads them.
The main problem is that most people don’t know how to recognize fake news, and their first reaction is to share it, thus spreading the rumor. The immediacy offered by social networks and digital means constitute the ideal environment for lies to spread like wildfire. And before we can stop them, they will have reached thousands of people!
It is undeniable that fake news practices shop have their consequences on digital marketing. However, not all strategies have the same purpose and interest.
Get Using Fake News in Content Marketing visits
Fake news is usually extravagant and striking in order to arouse the reader’s curiosity. Many pages take advantage of these characteristics to get visits to their sites and to earn money with the ads that are published on them. Some companies have even made a fortune like this in recent years!
A very controversial example of the use of this technique was during the American elections. Young people from Macedonia used the sharing of fake pro-Trump news to get visits. This technique was a success because, at the cost of the viralization of this news, they earned in 3 months about $ 16,000!
Others take advantage of the false filtration of this news to measure the possible impact that certain changes could have in their products or services thanks to the opinions and reactions of consumers.
Shaping public opinion
Some have more manipulative intentions. They try to distort reality through news that gives more importance to feelings and beliefs than to objective facts. This is called “emotional lying”.
This modality has been used mainly for political purposes, such as for the US elections or during the Brexit controversy. It is also used to distort the image of companies or people who represent products. It affects public opinion and affects the perception of the brand by customers.
There are also companies that use these fake news and disinformation techniques to pretend to be other brands, and take advantage of their social interest situations to sell their products and confuse the consumer who thinks they are buying a wisdom teeth removal: a key step in preventing dental issues legitimate brand. This generates doubts among customers, and permanently damages the public image of brands.
A fairly relevant case from a few years ago is that of the Starbucks company in the United States. An anonymous user posted a fake news on a forum, pretending to be the Starbucks company. The announcement stated that all illegal immigrants residing in the United States could benefit from a 40% discount on all products. When Starbuck text services tried to deny the news, it was too late. Thousands of people had already shared this news, which turned into a viral information.