Turns out that even online, some marketers are relying on the old adage – flattery will get you everywhere.

In our 10 year history, G.1440 and many of our talented employees have won awards and been recognized for innovation, growth, and excellence among other things, but recently, we got an email for an award that we had no interest in.

The “Selection Committee” (info@uslba2008.com) for the “U.S. Local Business Association (USLBA)” sent our Vice President an email notifying him that we’d won an award.  He forwarded the email to me with a quick not of caution.

“Tim: My guess is that this is merely a way for a company that produces plaques to sell more plaques, but I’d appreciate it if you’d follow up on this. I guess another more up-to-date award would look good

on our Boardroom wall, so please follow up on this and, if it’s legitimate get the plaque.

The press release MAY be something to put on our site? Not sure… if every company in Baltimore gets this “award”, then I will turn to you to figure out how we handle this thing.

Thanks.”

How nice.  Now they wanted us to celebrate our achievement by purchasing a plaque.

A quick once over of their website gives away the big problem here – there’s no credentials listed for the “USLBA”, no criteria for the award, no previous winners, not even a price for the plaque.  You must supply your full contact information for that info.

One Google Search later, and I stumbled across a few others who’d been hit with this same deceptive Marketing tactic. Thanks Patrick Byers!

G.1440 is awesome.  We know it, and we appreciate the recognition when it’s deserved.  Not when it’s just a way to sell a shiney board.

Tags: Deceptive Marketing, U.S. Local Business Association, USLBA, Vanity Scam

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 25th, 2008 at 5:15 pm and is filed under Marketing, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.