Devoted to online marketing, viral marketing, and web marketing

Warner Kremer Paino Advertising, which filed a strange lawsuit last month against a blogger for revealing and criticizing their online advertising campaign, has went capitulated. After Lance Dutson, the recipient of the suit, began his criticism of the campaign, which centered around the fact that they posted an ad that wrongly included a sex phone number instead of the real Maine tourist information number.

With the their response to Dutson, the blogging media picked it up and it went viral fast. Warner Kremer Paino Advertising then reacted by dropping the suit - but it was far too late to escape the damage of their decisions and efficiency as a business.

Their original lawsuit against Dutson was allegedly for copyright violation for reproducing the ad for everyone to see. Along with that they said that it was defamation and libel.

The complaint said: "Dutson's web log, or 'blog,' contains numerous defamatory statements designed to blacken WKPA's reputation, expose WKPA to public contempt and ridicule, and injure WKPA in its business and profession," alleged the complaint."

When you look at this overall debacle, it is good that this company is ridiculed. Who would hire them to do business for them when they handled this situation so poorly? They should have known the viral effect of going on the offensive and how attacking would make it even more widespread. They should have simply ignored it.

Pointing out the error that WKPA made was one thing that the company could have simply taken and changed quickly by putting the right number online. But with the lawsuit it became huge news and took off all over the web and the world. I think there's some lessons there on doing things right and wrong.