Follow-Up on USPS FakeChecks.org Campaign
Direct Response Advertising October 5th, 2007Yesterday I blogged about the USPS’ new anti-scam campaign directing people to FakeChecks.org. The whole point of my post wasn’t to criticize the Postal Service - I think the campaign is smart and the message is good. However, I believe there is a good chance many viewers will end up on the wrong website, not owned by the USPS.
A perfect example can be found on the KETV 3 website, a Santa Barbara news station. Directly from their website:
“According to the US Postal Service, scam victims lose $3,500 on average and are often responsible to repay banks for the money lost. The Post Service met with officials and residents to issue warnings and give tips on how you can avoid being scammed. The US Postal Service and Postal Inspection Service have set up a website at www.fakechecks.com so you can report fraudulent activity.”
Whether we like it or not, many people automatically assume a domain name is a .com no matter what the extension is. This confusion could potentially lead people to the wrong website, as can be seen by this inadvertant news article.
October 5th, 2007 at 4:12 pm
Bigger case in point:
Al Gore created the Live earth event to draw hundreds of millions around the world and call attention to a cause.
Their URL was liveearth.org but the TV URL had liveearth.msn.com where the millions of text message registrations went. Along with record traffic for Microsoft to attract advertisers for. People are still connected to LiveEarth through Microsoft. It’s as if they “hijacked” the brand equity in the event. Right now on liveearth.msn.com, there is a wrinkle cream ad running on this important cause page. Not sure that’s what Gore had in mind.
Meanwhile, it’s not sure how many people went to, and still go to liveearth.com- the owner of which uses the opportunity to make a political statement.
Seems crazy to me that Al Gore (the Internet forefather) and the organizers of a global event of unprecedented scope would move forward with a name to which they have no dotCOM call to action. but they did.
October 7th, 2007 at 1:04 pm
FakeChecks.com is a parked page with a pop-up. I bet that guy’s happy.