Bzzagent stung by own bzz

Bzzagent, a company that pays folks to talk up clients’ products and services, offered pro bono to help the CreativeCommons get people excited and evangelize its cause.

The move backfired when bloggers and commenters flamed the move. Bzzagent’s boss called one of the angry blogger’s work a “vicious cycle of lies.” The CreativeCommons rescinded its decision to collaborate with Bzzagent. And the whole thing unwound online, in full public view.

The bitter Bzzagent honcho commented: “Let’s get this straight: Over 80% of word of mouth occurs OFFLINE. Blogs are a tool for word-of-mouth interaction, but just because there’s plenty of them out there, it doesn’t mean it’s the best place for distributing an honest opinion.” While that perspective is open to debate, there’s no mistaking the fact that in this case, 100% of the word-of-mouth that drove this undeal was online.

(Via Brain Clark.)