Marketing Techniques Influencing America’s Nutrition at He's Fit

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Marketing Techniques Influencing America’s Nutrition

Posted April 1, 2008 at 12:00 PM by Megan Hueter

Section: In The News, His Health, Physical Health, His Nutrition, Healthy Eating

cheerios Understanding what you’re reading, who is behind what you’re reading and why they might have an interest in you is a very important aspect of becoming an educated consumer. I recently experienced the marketing techniques of nutrition professionals, and how their choice of URL’s could play a role in America’s education about nutrition.

Ever sit at the table in the morning and completely study the back of the cereal box resting in front of you? If you’re anything like me, you have done this before. This morning, I was reading the side panel of my Cheerios box and saw information regarding a nutritional website. Their marketing technique worked perfectly on me (kind-of). I was interested on what the site might have to offer me that General Mills wanted me to see. Immediately after finishing my bowl of goodness, I walked over to my computer and checked out the site.

I thought I remembered the box saying “Eat Right America.com.” So, I went to the URL. It turns out, Eat Right America is a collection of knowledge by Joel Fuhrman, MD and his nutritional medicine colleagues. I immediately recognized Dr. Fuhrman’s name - one, as an influential blogger in the nutritional community - he frequently blogs on DiseaseProof.com—and two, as the author of the best-selling book Eat To Live: The Revolutionary Plan for Fast and Sustained Weight Loss (2003). Eat to Live is a highly influential diet on the market today, complete with a published book and website.

However, I couldn’t (for the life of me) figure out how Dr. Fuhrman’s small site was able to afford to market on the side panel of a Cheerios box. This is because Cheerios is owned by General Mills, a fervent supporter of the American Heart Association (the front of the cheerios box usually features a heart-shaped bowl and has a ribbon across it, featuring something about AHA and how Cheerios are good for lowering cholesterol). So I double-checked the URL on the side of the box, which reads, “Eat Better America.com.” Ah, this makes sense now.

Created and funded by Minneapolis-based General Mills, Eatbetteramerica.com is designed for people who are increasingly interested in the impact food has on their health and crave simple, easy-to-understand health and nutritional information. The site has combined advice from the own experts at the Bell Institute of Health and Nutrition (General Mills) as well as Rodale. This site offers articles on nutrition, recipes, information on daily servings, and community forums where you are welcome to discuss this information. The site also markets brands like Green Giant, Yoplait Yogurt, Cheerios, organics Cascadian Farm and Muir Glen.

What’s interesting about this entire experience is the marketing techniques that these sites have in common. To someone who didn’t have the background knowledge (or, to someone like me who didn’t remember the URL name correctly) it would be easy to mistakenly associate either site (http://www.eatrightamerica.com or http://www.eatbetteramerica.com) with the closely-related URL, www.eatright.org, the official site from the American Dietetic Association (ADA), the nation’s largest organization of food and nutrition professionals.

This is yet another example of how we as consumers have to be conscious of what we read and remember. We should always look to see who is the sponsor of each site, what their affiliations are, and think about why they might be writing about a particular topic or advertising on a particular cereal box.

Research sources and for more information: [picture]