Stunt Bad for Marketing

BRANDWEEK did a follow-up story the other day about the infamous stunt pulled by Cartoon Network to promote its Aqua Teen Hunger Force. The pub wanted to see what impact, if any, the bomb hoax had on the business of guerrilla marketing.

Early reports after the Jan. 31 hysteria had many speculating marketers would seer clear of this big-bang/small bucks school of buzz building. After all, Cartoon Network gm/evp Jim Samples resigned; parent company Turner Broadcasting and guerrilla agency Interference agreed to pay $1 million in compensation to Massachusetts and another $1 million to support federal homeland security.

"The smarter clients I spoke to [realized] that a $2 million fine equals $120 million in publicity," said Peter Shankman, president of New York-based pr/marketing agency The Geek Factory. "They said, 'Just get the damn permits first!'"

Drew Neisser, president of the New York integrated marketing agency Renegade Marketing, said the incident "really heightened awareness of nontraditional marketing. The irony was people were saying, 'I want that.'"

The stunt and subsequent negative publicity may very well have created some short-term gains and heightened awareness of the power of guerrilla marketing. But it pissed off an entire city and touched a nerve with politicos. I still contend it was incredibly stupid considering post-9/11 America.

Several months after circuit boards with LED lights in the shape of a Mooninite caused the closing of major subway lines and roadways in Boston, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass. co-wrote and introduced the "Terrorist Hoax Improvements Act of 2007." The bill will amend the federal criminal code to include a number of new clauses meant to up the ante on wasting government resources. Provisions in the bill would allow the government to take civil action against parties involved in perceived hoaxes if they fail to "promptly and reasonably inform one or more parties... of the actual nature of the activity" once they learn about investigative action taking place. In the case of Boston, this means that everyone involved could be sued for not immediately informing the police of the campaign upon receiving news of the emergency reaction.

Talk about making an impact on the guerrilla marketing world. Not exactly what Interference had in mind I bet.

DVR Owners and Political Communications

I was catching up on reading last week's issue of PR Week when I was surprised by the results of a poll by The Benenson Strategy Group. The firm works with many Democratic candidates, the DCCC, the DSCC, the AFL-CIO and corporate clients like Verizon and Proctor & Gamble. The firm's principal, Joel Benenson, lead the internal polling for Clinton-Gore in 1996.

From what I can gather, the survey was commissioned by MSHC Partners, a direct mail and Internet advertising firm that works with Democratic candidates like Sen. Hillary Clinton, Sen. Chris Dodd and groups like NARAL, the Sierra Club and even the South Dakota Democratic Party.

The survey sampled 1,128 registered and unregistered voters both with and without DVR's to understand their habits and what it means for political campaigns. No surprise with a couple of the numbers.

• 60 percent of ads on recorded television are skipped by DVR users
• 50 percent of programming on TV is viewed in recorded form by DVR users

However, these next numbers left me a bit perplexed.

• 44 percent of DVR owners say TV ads are their most important source of political news
• 46 percent of non-DVR users say TV ads are their most important source of political news

Isn't that a tad bizarre? Sixty percent of DVR users say they aren't watching the ads, but they still use those ads as their main source of political news?

Since the survey was commissioned by a firm with a vested interest in the outcome, I question what this really means. MSHC has a lot to gain by convincing poltical candidates that direct mail and Internet is the way to go.

"What we found in this study is that this new technology does have an
impact on how voters get their information and while television still
remains the most influential source of information, as DVR ownership grows
it will become less efficient," said Hal Malchow, president of MSHC
Partners. "Cable television, with its hundreds of channels has also made it
increasingly difficult to reach the entire electorate, compared to the days
of dominance by three major networks. Between DVRs and cable television,
political ads are losing their punch."

Thoughts anyone?

This Took Guts

I'd heard Al Jazeera was going to make a play for legitimacy among mainstream Western media, but this ad in Newsweek is the first effort I've seen — and boy, did it get my attention.

Considering the status the Qatar news network holds in the hearts of many English speakers, the ad is positively punk rock.

But then, if you've been ranked as the 5th most influential brand in Europe and Africa, maybe you've earned a little swagger.

That said, does Al Jazeera have some "equity" in its status as an outsider to two of the largest markets on the planet, the US and Europe? Is it something that could actually work in its favor? That would seem to be at play here. Even as it looks for Westerners to embrace its news coverage, the network doesn't run away from the its legacy among English speakers.

In fact, with its Arabic script logo taking up more that half the page and its stark white-on-black design, there's something seriously in-your-face here.

I like it.

The copy is tame, but the design says "we're not laying on the gloss" here. I find the shock value here an intriguing choice. Leaders in both Europe and the States have excoriated the network for its choices of news coverage since 9/11. Nevertheless, "80 million cable and satellite households across the globe" have received coverage in English from 60 news bureaus since Al Jazeera English launched in mid-November, according to the network's English press room. I don't find the copy terribly believable, but the novelty made me go their site. And that changed my mind.

In a prepared statement that appears on the site, Al Jazeera English Managing Director Nigel Parsons  said, “I firmly believe there is a gap in the market which we will exploit, and that the world needs Al Jazeera in English to bring a new perspective and understanding to world events."

And perspective it delivers. Maybe the coolest thing about the site is its "Your Views" section, which brings together readers from the Middle East and the West in some lively exchanges. As the site states, "Broadcasting from the Middle East, looking outwards, Al Jazeera English will set the news agenda and act as a bridge between cultures."  That alone is worth the click, which might be the real value of Al Jazeera English.

And is that the real value of the Al Jazeera brand? Are they the "outsider" that's more dialed in than the rest of us? In terms of the brand, there's something very American going to that. Something very High Planes Drifter. But will we embrace a cowboy who rides in on an Arabian horse?

Blogging the election

A few weeks ago I did an interview with KELO TV (local CBS affiliate) for a story on political blogs. They interviewed me as the self-proclaimed blog-o-holic. In attempting to live up to that title, I thought I'd provide you the links for some blogs that will be covering today's election in South Dakota.

South Dakota War College will be live blogging from the GOP election party in Pierre. Todd Epp of South Dakota Watch will be doing the same from the KSFY studio.

The MSM is also getting in on the blogging action. At the Argus Leader Voices Blog, they are live-blogging the election from various polling places. They already have some good coverage. Similar coverage from the other end of the state can be found on Rapid City Journal's Mount Blogmore.

If you know any other blogs providing live election coverage, leave links in the comments section below. But that list should be enough to sap your productivity for the day. Vote early and often!

Campaigning for Wal-Mart

When it comes to the business of communications, I got my start in politics. That stint in public communications left me with the belief that businesses could learn a lot from politics, especially in the face of coordinated opposition. And when it comes to coordinated opposition, no business knows what that's like better than Wal-Mart.

Perhaps that's why Wal-Mart is drawing on political expertise for their latest image campaign, which is being led by former Democratic political strategist Leslie Dach. Profiled in AdAge today, Dach is running one of two simultaneous campaigns for Wal-Mart and is overseeing one of the most ambitious corporate-image makeovers ever. The other campaign is the retail marketing effort to move product.

The AdAge article refers to a :60 TV spot from Dach's camp, entitled "Sam's Dream" which you can view here.

Businesses like Wal-Mart are waking up to the realization that it's no longer good enough to simply mind your own business. Modern consumers expect their corporations to engage the community on multiple levels. It would seem that Wal-Mart is moving in the right direction, but only time will tell for sure.

Wikipedia and reputation management

It all started when someone decided to have fun with a Wikipedia entry. Nothing new, right? It happens all the time. But this entry happened to be about Stephanie Herseth, the lone member of the US House of Representatives from South Dakota.

The wiki-hacker claimed Herseth was pro-life (she's not), pregnant (she's not) and engaged to her campaign manager (she's not). The false information was taken down quickly, but not before it got a little more interesting.

Herseth is in a (very non-competitive) race for re-election this fall and her opponent's campaign manager couldn't leave the Wikipedia reference alone. He emailed it to several political bloggers...one of which happened to be the blog of the Rapid City Journal...who posted the full text of the email on the blog...and then defended their decision to do so.

As local political blogger Pat Powers noted, whoever put the false information on Wikipedia didn't do Republicans any favors. Neither did her opponent's campaign manager because now the discussion is about his email, rather than what they want to discuss. Not surprisingly the Herseth campaign has sensed the momentum in their favor on this issue and is calling for the campaign manager to be fired.

There are three important new media lessons here for anyone who cares to learn them. First, the Wisdom of Crowds is real and represents a new kind of information and fact exploration process. In the old days (only a few years ago) someone would research a story for days, weeks, months, even years before publishing the definitive account in a newspaper, magazine or book. If you wanted to respond to that account, you had to do the same thing yourself and it was very difficult to correct a story once it was published.

Today, the quest for the facts starts out in the open with a blog post or a Wikipedia entry. Everyone can read that information and respond to it. Eventually, the truth is discovered, as it was in this case, through the participation of a large group of people, like a virtual party. That's why Wikipedia is always among the most-searched topics on the net. That's also what makes blogging so difficult for most people to understand. Any one post may not be completely accurate, but is rather part of the process of getting at the accurate account. Sure, there will always be those who abuse the system, as there were in this case, but those people are typically found out and appropriately flogged.

Second, the Internet is not nearly as anonymous as you think. If I were you, I would avoid emailing anything you don't want the entire world to see. Bad email pitches can find themselves on the Bad Pitch Blog or posted on another blog that (at last count) had 80 comments. And by the way, your computer has a little thing called an "IP address" that leaves a convenient trail for people to follow. As we learned from the Cluetrain Manifesto and Adam Curry, there are no secrets, only information you don't yet have.

Third, you have to participate in the online conversation. If you don't, the party will start without you and how many of the millions of people online do you think care about your reputation? That's what I thought.

Let them eat cake!

The public sector in South Dakota has had some recent public relations difficulties. Governor Mike Rounds' war with the Argus Leader has been discussed on this blog and Sioux Falls Mayor Dave Munson has dealt with a variety of public missteps that prompted him to drop his reelection bid (before re-entering and winning).

But the problems listed above pale in comparison to the Sioux Falls School District since Pam Homan took over as Superintendent. Now, it should be noted that Homan is often just the bearer of bad tidings, having to be the public face for unpopular decisions made by the school board. But, without being privy to the decision-making process, this blog post will assess the PR problems of the entire school district.

First Amendment be damned!

The first public misstep was to continue defending a hopeless lawsuit from teacher Barbara Wigg, who had sued when Homan's predecessor told Wigg she could not help lead an after-school Christian activity for children at her school. Wigg won, but not before the district appealed multiple times. When the school board finally decided to drop the suit, the Argus Leader savaged them in a Dec. 17, 2004 editorial saying it's "the first smart thing the district has done since this mess started." The school district was also forced to repay Wigg's court costs and their total bill (not covered by insurance) for the suit was $154,000.

The Grinch

Then, just before Christmas, Homan canceled plans made by several teachers to take their students to see the movie Polar Express. Her decision to ban all field trips to see movies earned a disapproving editorial from the Argus Leader on Dec. 24, 2004 entitled "Grinchy Decision Ill-Timed." You can read some of it here.

Closing the door on public meetings

The next year, following a heated public battle over sex-education curriculum, Homan floated a lead trial balloon: future curriculum complaints should be discussed in closed-door meetings. As typically happens when public officials propose closing off public business from the public, the media vilified her and the trial balloon was popped.

Let them eat graduation cake!

There have been other smaller miscues (rules were changed to allow Homan to reside outside the district, the football bus scandal, etc.), but the latest public relations blunder takes the cake. It's almost too much to comprehend. The school district is barring two high school seniors, Jake Wampler and Nick Kelly, from participating in graduation ceremonies later this month. Why? Because they failed too many classes? Were caught with illegal substances? Had too many detentions?

Not even close. Kelly is one credit short after missing almost a year of high school due to a battle with leukemia. Wampler, who is five credits short, had his heart stop last year during football practice and he's been undergoing treatment for a brain injury. Sounds like a couple of slackers, huh?

The two seniors' classmates are threatening to boycott the graduation ceremonies. Read the entire story. The responses of Homan and the school board are unbelievable. I can't remember a government institution ever coming off as badly as in this case. Two kids, who have battled life-threatening illnesses, persevere and come so close to graduating are being denied the opportunity to walk across a stage with their classmates. It would be hard for Disney to come up with a more vile villain.

Argus Leader executive Editor Randell Beck has written yet another editorial critical of Homan, saying that she's once again staked out ground that is legally sound and morally indefensible. He asks the question: can someone explain to me how our society would crumble if we allowed Nick Kelly and Jake Wampler to join their Lincoln High School classmates at graduation ceremonies next month?

Marie Antoinette famously responded to bread-wanting peasants with the phrase: "Let them eat cake!" In response to a similar proclamation from Pam Homan, I say the rallying cry for these two high school seniors should be: "Let them eat graduation cake!" If Homan wants to have her contract renewed in 2007 and the rest of the school board members want to be re-elected (one has already been ousted), they would be wise to start thinking about how their actions play in the public.

Warring with the press

Because public relations involves people dealing with other people, things don't always go smoothly. Occasionally, things even degenerate into open warfare between those in media relations and the media they're relating to. I have witnessed some of these wars in person. Some of the clients and employers I've worked for in the past have had frayed relationships with one (or more) media outlets.

When I started working as the director of communications at a state University in South Dakota, I was warned that the biggest newspaper in the state "had it in" for the school. That paper, as the story was told, was stocked with reporters from the other big state school and they wore their bias on their sleeve and in print. I came to discover a far different reality.

It turns out that the paper's coverage of the school hadn't been very good because the school hadn't done a very good job of communicating with them. Like most reporters I've worked with, their bias was a bias in favor of a good story. Once they were fed those stories on a regular basis, they started showing up in the paper more often.

What jarred these thoughts loose from my head was an editorial from yesterday's Sioux Falls Argus Leader entitled A feud too far. It seems that there is a real war being waged between the paper and the administration of South Dakota Governor Mike Rounds (pictured here). The executive editor hinted at the strained relations in a column a few weeks ago, but the paper really brought the war out in the open in yesterday's paper.

I have no inside information so I don't know all of the past blood that has been shed in this fight. The Argus Leader has sued the Rounds administration to release the names of attendees at the annual governor's hunt and apparently a gag order has been issued by the governor's office to the executive branch that prevents them from commenting to the media. There is nothing on Rounds' web site, so their side of the story is not presented on the net.

There are times when you simply can't deal with a member of the press or a particular media outlet. Is this one of those cases? Is there a better way for the Rounds Administration to handle this? Do you have a similar story we can all learn from? What do you think?

Makes Sense — But to Whom?

File under "Just Because You Say So Doesn't Make It So."

I'm sure Vernon Brown as Mayor makes sense to Vernon Brown. But I have no idea why it should make sense to me.

Why does it make sense? To whom? How am I supposed to know? Faith? I'm confused. Which of course is another way of saying "it doesn't make sense."

Kudos to Brown for getting out in front of the gaggle of other candidates for Sioux Falls mayor. But for all its khaki/ mini-van confidence, the line "It Makes Sense" is conspicuously presumptuous —  an odd waste of the benefit of getting out first. Worst of all, the ad doesn't even give us a website to back up the claim, nor does Google — at least not on the first two pages of search results (anything after is a communications graveyard).

Anyone in marketing and communications ought to know that it's never enough to expect buy-in to a claim just because. Imagine if we said: "Toyota. It Makes Sense." Or, "Kraft. It Makes Sense." Would that get your vote?

NYC: Squeaky Wheel Gets Shellacked

If the idea behind a strike is to demonstrate the impact workers have on others — the NYC Transit Workers' Union has made its point. Maybe too well.

Is there anyone in NYC who feels good about millions of their neighbors brought to their knees — people whose financial welfare depends on the Christmastime economy? This is the New Coke for the TWU. Except you wonder if the group can ever recover from this stunning loss of the hearts and minds of New Yorkers.

A great sampling of invective from NYC editorial writers can be found at Jeff Jarvis's Buzzmachine here.

Thanks to Being Reasonable for the link; check out a couple choice slams there.