MarketingProfs

MediaBuyerPlanner: Commercial Alert has sent letters to more than 300 book review editors asking them not to review Cathy’s Book, a young adult book that has a partnership with Cover Girl to include product placement for Lipslicks and other products within the book’s content, writes Adrants.
The letter from Commercial Alert calls the book “part of a marketing campaign for Procter & Gamble’s Cover Girl line.” It goes on to say that, “It is not unknown for works of fiction to advance political and other agendas, but this crosses a line. Cathy’s Book is in the form of a novel. But in reality it is an adjunct of a corporate marketing campaign aimed at impressionable teenagers. Its contents have been altered to that end.
“Will you treat this book as a novel to be reviewed, or as an advertisement, which is suitable for discussion in the business pages?
“We strongly urge you to choose the latter. Something large is at stake here. There is a difference between a novel and an ad; and if you do not uphold that distinction, then who will?”