The Wheel of Sparta is a variation of Wheel of Fortune that a young net surfer can play on Disney Online’s Website. With the animated Hercules standing at the side of the screen, the game offers three categories: "Hercules Trivia," "Movie Insights" (a category which requires knowledge of the Hercules animated film) and "Greek Mythology." At the bottom of the gaming screen, a banner ad links to a series of Disney pages that list Disney book titles along with a quick link to purchase a Disney book from bookseller Barnes and Noble’s Website. While The Wheel of Sparta is entertaining (and sometimes difficult), it begs the question: Is this entertainment content or advertising designed for children?
With a growing acknowledgment that children help to determine many family buying decisions, advertisers are scrambling to reach young audiences in as many ways as they can. Even beyond their influence on purchases, children are often a key target audience because their early buying patterns can become habits for life. And because children have a less-developed critical judgment, they are often more susceptible to the lure of advertising. A recent New York Times article reported that advertising on children’s television exceeded $1 billion in ’98, and as content providers establish sites for children on the Internet, advertisers are seeking to use this new opportunity to get the attention of young minds.
While any medium is prone to blurring distinctions between content and advertising, the Web seems to be particularly adept at this, whether it’s the borders between fact and fiction or, in this case, content and advertising. Differentiating between advertising and content on the Internet is currently a self-regulated affair, which raises eyebrows in some corners of children’s advocacy organizations. The Children’s Advertising Review Unit (CARU), a division of the Better Business Bureau, has established guidelines for child-oriented Websites that attempt to keep advertising and content separate.
Two popular children’s destinations-Disney Online and Nickelodeon Online-provide sample scenarios for how content providers are addressing the issues of content and advertising. In both sites, ad banners are clearly labeled as "advertisements."
The Buena Vista Internet Group (BVIG), which oversees Disney Online as well as sites for ESPN, ABC, and ABC News, also has guidelines that, according to BVIG senior VP for advertising and sponsorship Scott Schiller, follow those of CARU. "We have always had very strict guidelines to the types of advertising that we take on our branded sites because the brands mean something," he said.
Peggy Mansfield, VP of ad sales for Nickelodeon Online, said that Nickelodeon’s site is for children between 6 and 14 years old, and explained that "any advertising must be appropriate for kids those ages." Both Schiller and Mansfield said that they conduct extensive reviews of any potential advertiser, examining their Websites to ensure that none of the content would be objectionable to children or their parents.
To ensure that children do not confuse the content site with their advertiser’s site, Nickelodeon provides an interstitial "bumper" page that pops up when a user clicks on the ad banner located in the Nick site. "We came up with this when we were trying to be proactive in communicating to kids online and differentiating between advertising and content," said Mansfield. The interstitial page reminds children that they are leaving the Nickelodeon site and encourages them to be wary of giving out any information online and to check with parents if they are asked to do so. Disney does not provide an interstitial page between their site and advertisers’ sites, though Schiller noted that in Disney’s Club Blast, a section for paying members, there were interstitials between the Blast pages and advertisers’ pages.
One trend in Internet advertising is the development of contextual opportunities for advertisers. BVIG, for instance, has a "partner" relationship with some advertisers. BVIG gives these partners easier links between Disney’s site and the advertiser’s site. One partner, for instance, is Barnes and Noble, and there is a button that links directly to Barnes and Noble’s site at the bottom of the Disney Online home page (the button is not labeled as an advertisement). Other Disney Online partners include Music Boulevard, an Internet-based music seller, and FTD, a flower retailer. Nickelodeon also has created relationships with some advertisers, such as Gap Kids, Kraft, or McDonald’s, who will sponsor a particular section of the site.
Advertising remains off-limits to certain areas of Disney’s and Nickelodeon’s Websites. Schiller noted that Disney accepts no ads for areas of the site designed for two- to five-year-olds, and Mansfield said that the Nickelodeon’s Nick Jr. section, which is geared to toddlers, would not accept advertising.
Ultimately, ensuring that children are protected from the invasive claims of advertising is a parent’s task. In order to preserve their credibility with parents, educators, and children, content providers clearly have a vested interest in establishing firm lines between children’s content and advertisers’ promotions. But drawing that line in a medium in which a Website’s characters are themselves the products being promoted is a vexing question.
