The idea behind PR is to increase the visibility of your brand in a way that’s beneficial to your brand. Over the last year several companies have proved that they can do the first part, but they really don’t have a grasp on how to make it beneficial…

1. Somerfields Easter Gaffe
In April of 2007, British supermarket Somerfields decided to put out a press release to promote their Easter range of products. But what angle could they go with? Then someone came up with the bright idea of commissioning a study to see if the youth of today knew the true meaning behind Easter. When the results came back how they expected them to come back, the press release was crafted and sent out. It talked about how young people really don’t know the Easter story, but at Somerfield they did, and you could buy your chocolate eggs at Somerfield safe in the knowledge that they were celebrating the birth of Christ… The next press release that went out changed it to “rebirth of Christ”… Then the Church of England got involved, and another release went out using the preferred term “resurrection of Christ”.

2. CompUSA sells empty boxes
In May of 2007, Terry Heaton purchased $3500 worth of items from his local CompUSA. One of those items was a $269 digital camera… well technically it was a $269 empty camera box. When Terry attempted to get CompUSA to give him the camera that they sold him, they told him that it was a liquidation store so all sales were final, despite them not actually giving him the item that he paid for. After a viral blogging campaign, CompUSA realised that this was not good publicity, especially for a company in the middle of closing half of it’s stores, so they eventually sent him a check for $300…

3. Microsoft Vista bribes bloggers
In December of 2006, Microsoft wanted to get bloggers talking about Vista, they wanted to get a jump start on a word of mouth campaign. The best way to do so? Obviously it was to send free copies of Vista to influential bloggers. But what if they had low end machines, or machines that wouldn’t work so well with Vista? The idea they came up with was to send the bloggers brand new laptops to go along with the O/S. Once that came out, there was a huge ethics outcry that Microsoft was perceived to be bribing bloggers with new laptops for a good review. Microsoft replied with a statement that they had told the bloggers that the laptops could either be sent back, auctioned off for charity, or disposed of however the bloggers saw fit. Unfortunately, according to several of the bloggers, those directions weren’t actually included with the laptops that they received…

4. Walmart and the fake blog
In September of 2006, a new travel blog was launched - Walmarting across America. The idea behind the blog was that a couple were going to be traveling across the US in their RV, stopping every night in Walmart parking lots, taking advantage of their RV friendly policy. It sounded like great publicity for Walmart, and it was… for about 48 hours. Then it came out that the couple were professional writers (both had written for the Washington Post), and that the whole trip wasn’t spontaneous, it was in fact sponsored by Walmart.

5. Sony and the fake blog
After seeing how great the Walmart fake blog (flog) worked, Sony decided that they’d do the exact same thing. They set up a flog, and created a bunch of fake YouTube rap videos allegedly of a couple of kids who wanted a PSP for xmas. Of course the true story came out, and they ended up with as much egg on their faces as Walmart.

6. Sony and the dead goat
Sony’s next entry in this list is from their launch party for God of War II. The decision was made to have a Greek themed launch party, complete with togas, serving wenches, and a goat carcass. Guests were asked to reach inside the goat’s still warm stomach to remove offal, with the person eating the most declared the winner. Sony was so proud of this event that they even published the pictures in the official Playstation magazine… which they promptly recalled after the inevitable public outcry.

Of course, when you go into the search engines for these companies, you now find these disasters showing up in their regular search results…  So what should these companies have done to avoid / minimize the impact of these PR errors?

1. Check your facts.
2. Double check your facts.
3. Have someone else sanity check your facts / plans.
4. Be transparent. Don’t try to hide who you are and why you’re doing something, as eventually it’s going to come out, and then people will get upset with you.
5. Listen to what your customers are saying, especially those that are online. If there’s a problem that you can nip in the bud, do so, don’t allow it to fester and grow into a nightmare.
6. Be part of the conversation. Don’t ignore what your customers are saying, and expect them to blindly take whatever it is that you have to say as gospel. Actively work with your customers, build up a level of trust between them and you, and it’ll serve you well in the long run.
7. Don’t be afraid to hold your hands up in the air and say that you were wrong, people will respect that more than someone blustering along or just downright ignoring the facts / using doublespeak.

So in other words, treat PR with care, don’t just assume that anything you put out is the final word, because in todays world of social media it most assuredly won’t be, and unless you realize that, you’re setting yourself up for a disaster.

Filed under: Reputation Management, Social Marketing on Friday, June 29th, 2007 by Simon Heseltine |
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