I recently witnessed a business get caught red-handed after stealing, copying and using their competitor’s online sales material. More on that in a second…

Remember the story about the promising college grad whose Facebook picture depicted him with half a dozen cans of Bud Ice, a funnel and a length of vinyl tubing? That photo wound up on the desks of hiring managers who stapled it to his otherwise strong resume. Ooops.

How are these related? When it comes to online marketing, unless password-protected, whatever you post online is accessible by everyone.

Last weekend, I attended a SCUBA-related convention in the Twin Cities where numerous dive shops exhibited. Most of these shops planned for this show for weeks and came armed with their unique promotional material with hopes of gaining new customers.

However, one northland dive shop took an ill-conceived short cut figuring they wouldn’t get caught. They grabbed PDF collateral directly from a competitor’s website, copied the layout verbatim (including content to the letter), and then substituted their own logo for their competitor’s and took it to press. Unfortunately for them, their thievery was exposed when the shops wound up side-by-side on the convention room floor.

One shop left the show humiliated, one shop left angry.

So, have you taken the pictures of your collegiate keg stand triumphs off of Facebook? Does your corporate website give your competitors proprietary information about your business? Seriously, what’s your take on using online media to share information without sharing too much?