Nobody puts baillee in the corner

I’ve gotten a lot of messages lately from various people I went to high school with regarding some weight loss products. Most of them have been well written and are simply general inquiries. As someone with a PR and Advertising degree, I can definitely understand creating brand awareness and wanting to collect testimonials for your product(s). I don’t mind seeing posts on Facebook, and I have nothing but respect for these individuals; I think it’s awesome that they are earning  bonuses and promotions within their company. Really, I think it’s great. I have, however, received a couple messages that aren’t okay.

There is a very fine line between sending out a generic message asking for participants and sending out messages with accusatory or hurtful tones, making it sound as though your target audience needs to lose weight using your product(s) or by trying to grab their attention through the use of (hopefully) inadvertent, backhanded compliments for a lede. Let me start with my one cold advertising statement of the century and point out that insulting your demographic is the easiest way to not only lose their business, but word of mouth, be it in person or through social media, is the most crippling medium you can imagine. Now that I’ve put my cutthroat (at least from me) advertising persona away, I want to talk about the bigger problem with these messages.

As many of you know, I struggled with various eating disorders as well as my self-esteem for many, many years, and quite frankly, it’s sometimes still an uphill battle. By sending messages with pointed language, you can make someone relapse. You don’t know where someone is in their journey, so it’s essential to write your pitches carefully. Luckily, I’m currently in a good place, but this isn’t the case for everyone. You can do some serious damage by sending these product endorsements to someone struggling with an eating disorder or their self- image. As I’ve mentioned before, it’s hard to know whether or not someone has or has had these issues because not everyone is forthcoming about it. My piece of advice is to really think about the wording of your message before hitting send because weight loss products can provide yet another obstacle for someone working to get better.

Again, most of the posts and messages I’ve seen/received have been nothing but professional and kind. This is just a friendly reminder to be careful. Words can cause a multitude of damage if phrased incorrectly.