--Jim Aikon, "How AbbVie Leverages Social for Earned Media." 8/7/18
http://www.prnewsonline.com/abbvie-social-earned-media-suzanne-barston
Reading this article was an eye-opening experience, particularly since I have written in this blog about Suzanne Barston, otherwise known as The Fearless Formula Feeder. She is the author of the book, Bottled Up: How the Way We Feed Babies Has Come to Define Motherhood and Why It Shouldn't. When her book came out; she did the usual publicity tour of talk shows, book signing, etc. I remember watching her on one talk show and thinking how does someone who is virtually unknown able to garner so many public and media appearances? For that matter how did she get published? I chalked it up to her being a writer and editor for health and parenting publications. But of course now I wonder about her employment with Abbvie. Was she employed by Abbott Labs or Abbvie during the time she blogged and wrote her book? Or was this job the ultimate reward for attacking breastfeeding advocacy, by a company that is a spinoff of Abbott Labs, manufacturer of Similac?
In 2011 Abbott Labs announced in the NY Times its intention to become 2 separate companies, a spinoff. This became official in January of 2013. Abbot Labs is considered the parent company.
"A spinoff retains its assets, employees, and intellectual property from the parent company which gives it support in a number of ways, such as investing equity in the newly formed firm, and providing legal, technology, or financial services."
--definition of spinoff, https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/spinoff.asp
Corporate Journalist, Suzanne Barston, states in a session brief about her talk. Speak Softly and Carry a Big Narrative: When Quiet Stories Speak the Loudest, posted at epharma,
"Complicating things further, patients and external audiences are more media savvy than ever. They can smell the complexity of marketing behind our best efforts; taste the inauthenticity in our paid influencer communications."
and last sentence regarding her intended talk,
"In this session, we'll examine how unbranded, journalistic content boosted a company's reputation in a tangible way, despite less-than-perfect metrics, and show how in the end, authentic storytelling is worth more than SEO [Search Engine Optimization-common term used by social marketing sites]."
https://lifesciences.knect365.com/epharma/agenda/3#think-like-a-patient_speak-softly-and-carry-a-big-narrative-when-quiet-stories-speak-the-loudest
Reading that last sentence I wonder whether her "authentic storytelling" that boosted a company's reputation is about her blog-The Fearless Formula Feeder? As a corporate journalist, she is concerned that media savvy people may "taste the inauthenticity in our paid influencer communications." Well, I am tasting it and I am a bit angry. Our corporate journalist totally denied and dismissed the breastfeeding advocates who smelled something fishy about her blog. I wrote about it back in 2014,
http://vwmcclain.blogspot.com/2014/07/marketing-infant-formula-with-magic-of.html
The really sad thing about this is that her blog has been quite influential. Her blog influenced quite a few breastfeeding advocates and some breastfeeding organizations to tone down their advocacy for fear of causing shame in formula feeding mothers. But she also was politically influential. In a position paper written by Jennifer Doverspike in 2013 to the The Federalist, a Republican conservative think tank organization, Doverspike writes in the second paragraph of her 6 page paper,
"Don't believe me? Just ask Suzanne Barston, the founder of a website dedicated to freedom in infant feeding choices. Her blog, Fearless Formula Feeder (Tag line: Standing up for formula feeders...without being a boob about it) is about the battle to destigmatize formula feeding. When Mayor Bloomberg announced his Latch On NYC initiative in 2012, Barston went nuclear."
--Jennifer Doverspike, The Literal Nanny State--Breastfeeding and Public Health Officials, The Federalist
http://thefederalist.com/2013/10/29/literal-nanny-state-breastfeeding-public-health-officials/
Doverspike continues on to discuss the WHO Code as restrictive to access of formula, formula advertising and samples given to mothers. She states, "The WHO Code appears to be organized around a simple, if dubious, premise: It's always the evil corporations' fault." Then she writes about Iran taking control of the import and sale of infant formula (only available by prescription). She considers this madness. She considers it an encroachment on personal freedom.
No, Jennifer Doverspike, this is not about personal freedom, its about corporate freedom to influence generations of parents to use their products no matter what the risks. Her introduction of don't believe me, read The Fearless Formula Feeder website seems rather ironic. Maybe it would be more truthful if this paper had just given out the Abbot Labs or Abbvie websites rather than Suzanne Barston's website. Has this paper influenced US politics? I would say so after reading about the performance of the US delegation to WHA (World Health Assembly) regarding support of breastfeeding. This Republican Administration appears to be under the sway of this particular paper.
Doverspike gives breastfeeding its token benefits but states they are exaggerated. Her concerns are supposedly about the USA becoming a "Nanny State," where personal choice becomes limited. Yet I have to wonder, if the real concern is about propping up a billion dollar industry, so that there is no governmental oversight, no regulations?
She states that the benefits of breastfeeding are exaggerated. She ought to read a few infant formula patents in which the infant formula company just has to use a synthetic/genetically engineered imitation of a human milk component to improve or make a safer product. Interestingly I have read various breastfeeding advocates who state there are no benefits to breastfeeding. Ignorance versus ignorance seems to be the way of our media-crazed social marketing internet.
Well, Fearless Formula Feeder, aka corporate journalist (although I fear I will never like the word-journalist-any more); how do you sleep at night? Any regrets? It feels like a con, smells like a con, by god we have been conned.
Copyright 2018 Valerie W. McClain
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