Brandkarma

Brands on notice as rating website launches
JULIAN LEE
March 26, 2010 - 10:04AM



The wisdom of the crowds as well as its collective buying power is being harnessed to reward companies that treat the planet and workers well and punish those that don't. A web-based service created by an Australian launches this week to enable shoppers to vote on which companies treat their staff, customers, suppliers, investors and the environment the best.

Thought to be the first of its kind the service invites users to comment and rate a company based on up-to-the-minute information it publishes about the world's top 300 brands.

By aggregting the individual opinions of thousands of users 'the crowd' determines how good or bad a company is. High-scoring companies are likely to attract more custom from communities of concerned shoppers, while lower-scoring one will be encouraged to do better.

Brandkarma founder Craig Davis said it adds "another voice in the room" to balance those of NGOs, corporations and governments in the debate around sustainability.

"The question around the choices that we make is becoming more significant. People exercise those choices - in effect their vote - every time they buy something," said Mr Davis, whose day job is chief creative officer at Sydney advertising agency Publicis Mojo.

After more than 20 years of creating ads for global companies such as Nestle, Shell, Unilever and Ford, Mr Davis said he asked himself the question: "What kind of world do you want to live in - and leave to your kids." The answer is a service that borrows social networking tools to create a Facebook of brands that claims its mission is to "help people help each other make better brand choices and encourage companies to be good to all their stakeholders".

A brand's overall performance is easured by its appearance on the website – red is bad while green is good – and by its overall score that can allow comparisons to be made with competitors. He said he was not worried about companies that were receiving poor ratings rorting the system as they "would eventually be found out". He would make money out of selling the insights gleaned from the data back to companies to "make better brands" but would not divulge any personal information of users. Experts in the field of ethical or consumer activism welcomed the idea. Oliver Wagg, the managing editor of Ethical Investor magazine, said that Australian consumers who were interested in shopping sustainably had few places to turn to for information.

"An increasing number of directories and websites are emerging to help consumers make the right decision about 'green' products and services. But these sources generally point consumers to products and services that brand themselves as 'green', leaving them to carry out their own verification and of course open to false advertising, or 'greenwashing'," he said.

Although Brandkarma is thought to be the first service of its kind in the world, consumer activism in generally has already taken root.

A US-based service called Carrotmob is gaining traction with its co-ordinated grassroots efforts that leverage consumer power.

In October its Australian debut attracted 200 people who shopped exclusively at a Surry Hills supermarket that had pledged 20 per cent of its sales to go towards the "greening" of the store. More such events are planned.

Source: smh.com.au