The New Threat of Digital Marketing

Because of their avid use of new media and their increased spending power, children and teens have become primary targets of a new "media and marketing ecosystem." The digital marketplace is undergoing rapid innovation as new technologies and software applications continue to reshape the media landscape and user behaviors. The advertising industry, in many instances led by food and beverage marketers, is purposefully exploiting the special relationship that youth have with new media, as online marketing campaigns create unprecedented intimacies between adolescents and the brands and products that now literally surround them.