The internet has certainly upped our lives in many ways and aspects. One excellent example is in advertising. If in the olden days, advertising was done through print publications and TV commercials; now, business and product promotion are done inexpensively and efficiently through social media networks. Advertising electronic cigarettes is not an exemption to this. Up on the social media Twitter, you can actually get to see numerous tweets about certain brands of electronic cigarettes. However, most of these tweets are questionable and dubious.
Electronic Cigarettes Are Still Subject To Regulation
Electronic cigarettes are products that are now in the hot seat of controversy because a lot of them are sold in the market and used by many people, despite lack of recommendation and approval from the health sector. Manufacturers and companies making these products are even warned by the government not to hand out efficacy, safety and therapeutic claims because they are still in need of further study.
Health Media Collaboratory Research
Incidentally, there was a recent study performed by the team of Health Media Collaboratory (from University Of Illinois in Chicago). The team performed an analysis on Twitter traffic so that they could know about the marketing and promotion of electronic cigarettes on social media networks. The study, interestingly, is still being considered for publication on an academic journal.
Research Findings
What the team found out is that there is indeed a steady stream of Twitter tweets; yet, most of them are likely created by bots or programmed Twitter accounts. What might be more alarming is that the tweets flaunt about the safety and health benefits of the products, although the issues are yet to be settled. These bot tweets essentially push the products as effective smoking cessation aids.
With this study, a new battle line can be opened against social media advertising, which would include adherence to regulations and what this advertising form is all about. It can be recalled that in 2011, the FDA lost battle with the hatchling electronic cigarette industry, but the agency said that a regulation for the products is underway. Despite the absence of regulations, makers and companies are not supposed to make any claims that the devices are approved or effective smoking aids.
In 2012, more than 73,000 tweets in just a two-month period were analyzed. About 11% of these commercial tweets that can possibly reach 7.4 million Twitter users peddled that electronic cigarettes are beneficial cessation devices. These tweets in question are not organic and are also not part of the network’s advertising program. Their nature is commercial: advertising resellers and websites of electronic cigarettes.
From these tweets, it appears that some companies are not patiently waiting for the FDA’s final verdict on electronic products as they have already distributed unfounded claims. It can be understood that these resellers and companies are merely taking advantage of the relatively easy and substantially cheap advertising means that Twitter and other social media can offer. They created anonymous accounts, acquired followers and then programmed to post automated tweets not in favor of FDA’s ban that electronic cigarettes be advertised as smoking cessation aids. Tweets that directly mention health benefits of electronic cigarettes likely came from smaller companies, not from big tobacco companies that have just entered the market scene.
On leading sellers’ websites, one could read different creative copies that suggest, not directly claim that using electronic cigarettes is better than smoking cigarettes. These bots and other similar messages on social media are likely to occur while the public awaits FDA regulations on electronic cigarettes.
