Part 2: MN misrepresentation in recommendations: a depressing blend of abject amateurism and outright greed

[Wondermoomin]

Welcome to part 2. The quote I’ve added in the title is actually a generic quote about MNHQ not specifically about product recommendations, but it’s very eloquent and quotable.

Here is part one: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5326652-mn-have-used-my-quote-to-promote-a-product-ive-never-bought

And here’s a brief summary so far:

• MN were caught out, allegedly acting in breach of ASA guidelines among other things
• The thread was temporarily hidden
• MN then provided a few explanation posts saying that this was a one-off cock-up and sorry that we MNers were confused
• Then we were told that in 99% of cases, the quotes refer to the specific products being featured; in a tiny minority, they are referring to a generic product category and will make that clearer
• Several users easily discovered multiple other examples, suggesting that it wasn’t just 1% of cases, or a one-off cock-up
• MN went on an editing spree of their swears by/recommendations sections (editing about 64 out of 75 things), also suggesting it’s not just 1% or an isolated cock-up
• The thread largely disappeared from active and trending, suggesting it’s been suppressed
• MN says it hasn’t been suppressed, threads appear in active based on popularity and how new they are
• Another MN source shows that they do sometimes remove threads from active to give them a chance to “calm down”

Please feel free to use this thread to capture any other examples you find, to update on anything you hear back from ASA, to provide your own professional or common sense input.

If you don’t agree, it’s probably not the thread for you so please feel free to pass on by! An issue doesn’t have to be the most pressing matter of our times to be important, and I think it’s important that trusted brands don’t mislead consumers.

I suspect you've answered your own question there...

unless there was a significant payoff from the company whose product you’re advertising

So we have had a whole day since the bank holiday and absolutely no response from MN? I'm pretty surprised at that.

I wish I was, but looking at the summaries @Wondermoomin and others have put up on this thread and the last, there is a pattern of behaviour

Very true. But at least previously Justine and someone else did respond, as unsatisfactory as that was.

I was actually quite impressed with justine on the first thread.
She apologised quite sincerely, and spent some time engaging with @Wondermoomin, answering her questions, etc.

Sadly, it quickly became evident she was massively minimising

Since them (5pm ish on a BH weekend) the silence has been deafening.
And that is very disappointing.

I am wondering if the usual mnhq responders (Becky, Hebe, et al) have been told NOT to comment because Justine's on it.
But she's since been MIA.

I also wonder as a couple of pp's have suggested, that they're hastily getting legal advice.
It does seem they've acted Illegally. Again from posters who say they work in legal or marketing

I think it’s good that Justine got involved and that she replied to a few of the questions.

Had it been true that it was a one-off or just 1% of cases, it could have been the end of the matter… but because the explanation doesn’t hold up, it’s not resolved.

Yes the editing spree might mean there’s nothing misleading still live on the site (good) - but what about MN’s integrity and trying to restore trust?

It’s impossible to do that while at the same time pretending it was just a single mistake, and then ignoring all the other “mistakes”.

I’m still hopeful that we’ll get a more considered response and an apology that doesn’t sound like “sorry you’re confused”.

Totally agree.

You're awesome btw ❤️💪💪💪

I REALLY hope they don't ban you (as a pp suggested)
That would be sooooo shoddy

@Wondermoomin may I pm you?

What would be the point in banning OP? Are they going to ban every other user that's caught them out too? The cat is well and truly out of the bag.

First they fail to protect their users from being exposed to child sexual abuse images and now they're caught out lying and manipulating users. Wtf happened MN?

Sure

Hi all,

Thanks to everyone who raised concerns about the use of quotes in our recommendation emails and on-site content. You were right to question it, and I want to reiterate unequivocally: I’m sorry this happened. It’s clear that our editorial standards haven't been high enough.

Our intention has always been to offer genuine, helpful recommendations that we believe Mumsnet users will love. I don’t believe there was ever a deliberate intent to mislead - we’ve always linked user quotes to their original threads and haven’t hidden the context. But, having now reviewed this thoroughly, it’s clear that in some cases we’ve been both lax and rushed in how we've used quotes to support recommendations.

Initially, I thought these were isolated incidents. I was wrong. Your feedback — and our internal review — shows this has happened more than a few times. That’s not acceptable, and we’re taking it seriously.

We’ve already started a full audit of all editorial content — including every Swears By and product review article (over 600 in total) — to ensure that every user quote is directly relevant to the product being recommended. Where quotes don’t meet that bar, they’ll be removed. If a quote is still helpful — say, it relates to a brand’s overall reliability or a feature common across a category — we’ll make sure it’s clearly marked as such.

For transparency: we do earn affiliate commission on most of the products we recommend (typically somewhere between 5–10% across a category), but no brand can buy an editorial recommendation. Sponsored content is clearly labelled, and our Mumsnet Reviews are based on weeks of hands-on, independent testing by our in-house team.

Trust has always been at the heart of Mumsnet. We can’t undo these mistakes, but we can fix them and do better. Thank you again for pointing it out - it’s been more than a bit humbling but incredibly helpful.

Horrible to be let down, isn't it@

There is form for mnhq banning, sadly

I know none of us have a right to be here, but it's just so shitty isn't it. And no way to run a business. Ugh

That's a lovely post @JustineMumsnet
Will you consider my request to put the original post into classics? In order that other and future mners might be aware of this?
I'd also like this thread to be nominated for classics, please

Please provide @Wondermoomin with a personal apology. I was trying to imagine how I would feel in her shoes. The least I’d expect was someone at MN approaching me directly. Just common courtesy. Knowing she’s not had anyone contact her doesn’t sit right with me.

I don't think of it as a classic if I'm honest RockyRogue.

I did so on the first thread but very happy to reiterate our apologies.

Who gets to decide if something is a classic? I would say this is more worthy than some!

It's good to have this update. And that does sound like progress

However, I think the whole "swears by" brand suggests or implies that lots of mumsnetters are raving about a product, not that some marketing person has trawled pages and pages of threads to find one comment that is vaguely in favour of the product

I do!!!!

If you're genuinely upset by how all this has played out, why wouldn't you want to future proof or warn other users in the future.?

IF your apologies were genuine..... ????

Fair point.

I don’t believe there was ever a deliberate intent to mislead - we’ve always linked user quotes to their original threads and haven’t hidden the context. But, having now reviewed this thoroughly, it’s clear that in some cases we’ve been both lax and rushed in how we've used quotes to support recommendations

Given that there have been many examples given where MN have been shown to edit quotes so that they no longer refer to the original product (the Kindle fire being the first that springs to mind), do you really expect people to believe that there was no intention to deceive? It's not like saying that gazebos are nice in the summer, it referred to specific properties of an obsolete, discontinued product, that was then used as a review for a different one. Not even the latest version of the old one, a different product. Lax and rushed are not excuses for editing a quote to hide the fact that it was for something else.

Don't be so ridiculous.

Makes me wonder why people still come here if they're so unhappy. There are a zillion forums out there.

Classics indeed.

Thinking about it, I think what has gone wrong is that probably when it started out, @JustineMumsnet spotted that certain products were widely recommended by mumsnetters, and generally praised on countless threads. At which point yes it makes sense to look for a way to monetise those recommendations

But then it's clearly become something where MN feel the need to fill a regular email with new recommendations, and generate income by finding companies happy to pay the commission.

The result, a scraping around for something, anything in a post anywhere, however tenuous and ancient to justify a claim that a product is recommended

I think for the "swears by" brand to work at all, MN need it to be an irregular feature, when there does seem to be at least some degree of genuine praise for a product in recent threads.

Otherwise to avoid misleading I would take out any even hint or implication that mumsnetters generally are endorsing the product and call the feature something like "MNHQ promotes" instead.

I do agree with this. No business is going to want to display their cock ups, so suggesting it goes in classics is just taking the piss.

Mumsnet has messed up, but some do seem to be relishing in it. The important thing is that it’s been pointed out, Mumsnet has now admitted they were wrong, apologised and are changing things doing forward. No, it shouldn’t have happened but we are where we are and imo we can’t really ask for more than what they have said in response, assuming they stick to what they have said.