First Analysis of Online Food Advertising Targeting Children

FIRST ANALYSIS OF ONLINE FOOD ADVERTISING TARGETING CHILDREN
[SOURCE: Kaiser Family Foundation press release]
Concerned about the high rates of childhood obesity in the U.S., policymakers in Congress, the Federal Trade Commission, and agencies such as the Institute of Medicine have explored a variety of potential contributing factors, including the marketing and advertising of food products to children. One area where policymakers have expressed interest, but have also noted a lack of publicly available data, is in the realm of online food marketing to children. In order to help fill this gap, the Kaiser Family Foundation released the first comprehensive analysis of the nature and scope of online food advertising to children, to help inform the decision making process for policymakers, advocates, and industry. The report, It’s Child’s Play: Advergaming and the Online Marketing of Food to Children, found that more than eight out of ten (85%) of the top food brands that target children through TV advertising also use branded websites to market to children online. Unlike traditional TV advertising, these corporate-sponsored websites offer extensive opportunities for visitors to spend an unlimited amount of time interacting with specific food brands in more personal and detailed ways. For instance, the study documents the broad use of “advergames” (online games in which a company’s product or brand characters are featured, found on 73% of the websites) and viral marketing (encouraging children to contact their peers about a specific product or brand, found on 64% of sites). In addition, a variety of other advertising and marketing tactics are employed on these sites, including sweepstakes and promotions (65%), memberships (25%), on-demand access to TV ads (53%), and incentives for product purchase (38%). "Online advertising's reach isn't as broad as that of television, but it’s much deeper,” said Vicky Rideout, vice president and director of Kaiser’s Program for the Study of Entertainment Media and Health, who oversaw the research. “Without good information about what this new world of advertising really looks like, there can't be effective oversight or policymaking, whether by the industry or by government,” she noted. The advertising industry has announced that it is developing more detailed voluntary guidelines for online marketing to children, expected to be released shortly.
http://www.kff.org/entmedia/entmedia071906nr.cfm

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