Sony wins big with "Thriller" guerrilla marketing stunt

To celebrate the 25th anniversary of the release of Michael Jackson's mega-hit album "Thriller," Sony/BMG Music has staged some really cool re-creations of the iconic dance number from the title track.

A story in the March 10 issue of The New York Times reports on groups in London, Copenhagen and Sydney seeming to spontaneously break into the zombie dance in crowded settings, only to melt away and back into the crowd when the dance is over, as if nothing ever happened.

These videos have now been viewed by well over a million people, all over the world.

It is what we "old timers" used to call a publicity stunt. Only now, we are calling it guerrilla marketing, and with the advent of YouTube and social media, these events get transmitted all over the world, making millions of impressions.

I give Sony/BMG a lot of credit. What is more recognizable a dance than Michael Jackson and his "Thriller" entourage of "zombies"? And to see otherwise normal-appearing folks (they are, in fact, trained professional dancers) in everyday settings all of a sudden breaking into a choreographed routine, well, it is genius.

I love the fact that the Times saw fit to report on it. My only nit-pick of a complaint is that they ran it under a banner that read "Advertising." In fact, this is what PR agencies do for their clients every day. Advertising folk only WISH they had the power to make this much of an impression for such a relatively small amount of money.

PR Pays Big?

I had to stop and read Joan Whitlow's incredible story in today's Star-Ledger (for those of you from out of state, the Star-Ledger is the quasi-official state paper of New Jersey, and Tony Soprano's newspaper of choice).

Joan, one of New Jersey's most effective, insightful, and highly-regarded columnists, wrote a column for today's website entitled "PR Pays Big, Though Not For Public." The story it tells about sweetheart contracts to well-connected "marketing communications firms" in Newark is just heartbreaking to those of us who try very hard to run professional, buttoned-up PR firms, and who fight tooth-and-nail against perceptions that PR is somehow a "fluff" job, and that we are all just "flacks" who come in at the crack of noon, take a journalist out to lunch, then make a few phone calls before hitting the links.

Perhaps if I had a few of those $358,000 contracts from the Newark City Council, I could do just that!

The City needs a new website, and it SHOULD be communicating with its citizens far more frequently and far more aggressively and effectively than it has up until now. My suggestion? How about hiring REAL PROFESSIONALS and not some "made-up-just-to-get-this-contract" firm owned by someone's relative.

Mayor Booker: I offer my services -- FREE OF CHARGE TO THE CITY OF NEWARK -- to work with you to write a scope-of-work, to head up a selection committee, and to choose a PR firm for the City that will help you fulfill your promise of honest, effective, transparent government.

But I'm not holding my breath waiting for your call.

Some Blogs I Like

Here are some PR-related blogs that I find useful and/or enjoyable. You should try a few of them out!

O'Dwyer's PR Blog (a great round-up of all things PR)

Harold Burson's Blog (Always gives you something to think about)

SPS Group Blog (I just met Dave in person today -- a real stand-up guy)

Peter Shankman's Blog (Peter is a real character, but a great and highly creative guy)

The Bad Pitch Blog (Where Richard Laermer and Kevin Dugan tell PR people the way it REALLY is!)

Trenton Makes (dumb rules) -- Newspapers Take (it on the chin)

An area of concern for the advertising and PR community in New Jersey is a bill that would no longer require that legal notices be placed in newspapers around the state. The measure (A-1083), recently passed unanimously in the Assembly Commerce and Economic Development Committee, would allow legal notices to be placed on official government websites, instead of in newspapers, as is currently required.

Passage of this bill would further weaken the financial health of newspapers -- at a time when many are already on life support. In addition, it is argued that Internet use is by no means universal, and there exists a significant population (mostly older) that does not yet have Internet access.

Since the state, also by law, sets the rates that newspapers can charge for this “legal advertising” -- at rates that have not changed since 1983 (when Ronald Reagan was President and many of us were humming Duran Duran’s “Rio”), the savings to the state and municipalities would not be as dramatic as you might at first think.

Given all of that, I believe there is no good reason that legal notices should not continue to be placed in newspapers and at the same time, on government websites. After all, shouldn't we be demanding MORE government transparency, and not less?

Perhaps there will come a day when legal advertising exclusively on government websites will make sense. I don't believe that time has arrived.

In a bizarre twist – even for New Jersey – at the same time that the government is seeking to save money by eliminating the requirement to post legal notices in newspapers, two bills, A 1092 and A-1106, would require newspapers to run certain political advertising free of charge.

Will SOMEONE in Trenton PLEASE wake up?

Karl Rove Champions PR

Karl Rove (don’t stop reading here just because you don’t care for Mr. Rove – neither do I!) wrote an interesting op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal last week, commenting on the state of the Presidential campaigns to date.

In the piece, Rove makes a few interesting observations:

Rove states that, contrary to conventional wisdom, TV ads for candidates are not as effective in moving the electorate as they once were. “Voters are discounting advertising…relying more on personal exposure, information from social networks, alternative information sources like talk radio and the Internet and local media coverage,” said Rove.

What Rove is saying is that PR works far better than advertising in moving people on an emotional level – an argument you may have read once or twice before on this blog. (As an aside, I would argue that the ascent of John McCain on the Republican side argues against the importance of talk radio, where the vitriol against the Arizona Senator has been non-stop, but that is probably just Rove throwing a bone to his buddies.)

Then, Rove drops a bomb on advertising, by suggesting that the PR person is more important to a candidate than the advertising person. “The 20th century’s closing decades saw the rise of the TV ad man as the most potent operator in presidential campaigns. The 21st century’s opening decade is seeing the rise of the communications director and press spokesman as the more important figures on the campaign staff,” he tells us.

‘Nuff said.

Airline rant

As someone who flies commercial airlines quite a bit, it always strikes me as curious why the carriers don't:

- Know from year to year that hundreds of thousands of people will be flying to large trade shows, like the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, every year at the same time. Couldn't they add a flight or two on those days when they know, from past experience, that the airports will be jammed to capacity, and that they will be bumping people off of flights left and right? Perhaps they could think ahead (for once; I know this is not their strong suit), and bring in larger planes for those days?

- Enforce carry-on rules. I see idiots getting on planes with bags that are WAY beyond restrictions. This causes others, who follow the rules but who might board later, to have to wrestle with their bags under their feet for a 5-hour flight. Worse, many of these people obviously think themselves superior to the rest of the flying public, and place these oversized bags in the first few overheads, as they stroll back to their seats in the back of the plane.

- Tell us the truth. Unless you're Jed Clampett, you know that a snow storm in Chicago will cause delays throughout the country. We get it. So tell us the truth (and keep us updated) about when we can expect to see a plane pulling up to our gate. Believe me, the folks in the Budweiser Brew Pub will appreciate the extra business as well!

What Automotive Repair can Teach us About Communication

An old friend of mine, Blair Enns, tells the story of how his car was acting up one day. Sure that it was a matter of the tires being out of balance, he went to the local repair shop and paid to have all four wheels re-balanced, only to find that the car STILL had the same "shimmy" to it on the highway. Incensed, he went back and demanded that they "do something" about the problem.

When the mechanics looked at the car, they discovered that a broken tie-rod end was the culprit.

So who should he have been upset with? Fact is, he went to a place of business, and asked them to perform a service that they ordinarily sell. Upon reflection, he blamed himself, and paid for the subsequent repair (and learned a valuable lesson in the process).

I say the fact that he really didn't need the wheel balancing service, and ended up paying far more to fix the problem, is BOTH his fault and the fault of the repair shop.

On a very basic level, he got just what he deserved. He asked to buy something, and they sold it to him. On the other hand, a professional repair shop should have asked him some questions, and looked the car over before just jumping through whatever hoop the customer held up.

We in PR come face-to-face with this type of situation all the time. I can't tell you how often a client has come to me saying, "We need to hold a press conference!" More often than not, after reviewing the "news" that needs to be conveyed, discussing which journalists would most likely want to report on it, and the level of return that could be expected on what can be a pretty pricey investment, the decision is made to convey the news in a different manner.

The moral to the story: Make sure your PR agency (or ad agency, or marketing services firm, or whomever) isn't just "taking orders," but is really, really listening to you, getting to the heart of all of the issues, diagnosing your real need, and acting along with you as your partner in achieving real goals that will deliver tangible success.