Screw the backlash. This is brilliant. With the advent of every new media comes the gold rush; the scramble for the advertising, comms and marketing industries to find a sweet spot in which commercial content can gain, or at least hijack an organic audience before the platform undergoes a Facebook style-hypercommercialisation. I’ve been a fan…
Ben & Jerry’s have always had activism at their heart but they need to be careful not to overreach and turn into BrewDog.A lot of our PR fables seem to be confectionary-based these days, but as I’ve said before, junk food peddlers have some of the biggest mouths in the media industry.The ice cream barons…
Fast Food is a fascinating industry for PR-watchers, one of the few where brands still allot budget and freedom to big, bombastic stunts. In the UK we rarely go a month without a (largely very effective) Greggs wheeze, while across the pond an escalating series of shenanigans (of questionable PR value) has recently included Popeye…
I will be talking publicly about the repurposing of celebrity as a theme over the coming weeks and why you should keep your eyes out for this new style of celebrity. First of all, hats off to Marcus Rashford. He has managed to force as many U-turns out of this wobbling government as…
I will be judging the award for best PR campaigns at The Drum awards later this year, and there’s already a massive frontrunner in my mind. The anonymous executive with an eye for mischief who has banned Fawlty Towers has done something absolutely brilliant. Let me explain. Any great publicity stunt combines celebrity with controversy. I refuse…
When I saw that Bristol had torn down the statue of Edward Colston, it was a powerful event. An evil man of his time who made his fortune and built a city, lying at the feet of ancestors of the lives he ruined. It was a potent image, but I thought it could have been…
The key for modern unscrupulous politicians is to get between their critics and the electorate. Trump, Corbyn and Cummings have all spent hours talking about how the media is fake, bias and sitting in ivory towers laughing at the little people. It’s a potent siren song for any voter and Cummings clearly counted on it…
Unintended consequences are often the result when leaders communicate without a clear understanding of the media, the crowd and their own people. Leadership once associated and celebrated for being able to create order from chaos, will now be applauded for thriving in it, with policies, that back in February would have seemed unworkable, now the…
Reputation is hard won and easily lost if you’re not careful. Today, as the judge dismissed multiple claims in Meghan Markle’s case against Associated Newspapers, her reputation is under the spotlight again and will be the subject of many headlines and debates, most of which will examine her motives and image and fuel the type…
In crisis situations we tend to move faster. We react and defend and there’s nothing wrong with that until any lack of thinking and preparation alongside, comes back at us with force. We have all seen daily examples of hope and positivity from business and people as well as what happens when any combination of…