Marketing to Kids Online: You can't steal candy from the baby

I recently discussed how children became consumers and what could be learned from the Build-A-Bear phenomenon, and as promised I am going to apply this marketing to children online. Over the next week I will be posting on this topic.

First, it should be mentioned that there are guidelines concerned with advertising to children offline and online in the United States. The Children’s Advertising Review Unit is a self-regulatory program and these are their core principles:

1. Advertisers have special responsibilities when advertising to children or collecting data from children online. They should take into account the limited knowledge, experience, sophistication and maturity of the audience to which the message is directed. They should recognize that younger children have a limited capacity to evaluate the credibility of information, may not understand the persuasive intent of advertising, and may not even understand that they are being subject to advertising.
2. Advertising should be neither deceptive nor unfair, as these terms are applied under the Federal Trade Commission Act, to the children to whom it is directed.
3. Advertisers should have adequate substantiation for objective advertising claims, as those claims are reasonably interpreted by the children to whom they are directed.
4. Advertising should not stimulate children’s unreasonable expectations about product quality or performance.
5. Products and content inappropriate for children should not be advertised directly to them.
6. Advertisers should avoid social stereotyping and appeals to prejudice, and are encouraged to incorporate minority and other groups in advertisements and to present positive role models whenever possible.
7. Advertisers are encouraged to capitalize on the potential of advertising to serve an educational role and influence positive personal qualities and behaviors in children, e.g., being honest, and respectful of others, taking safety precautions, engaging in physical activity.
8. Although there are many influences that affect a child’s personal and social
development, it remains the prime responsibility of the parents to provide guidance for children. Advertisers should contribute to this parent-child relationship in a constructive manner.

You can read the full guidelines here [PDF].

I think it is important, when advertising to children to consider that they are still children, and therefore one must be more conscious of what is being said and what is being promoted. While you want to make money and market your site, you still don’t want to be evil and “steal candy from a baby”.

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