Bad planning or deliberate attempt to create publicity?

A Dove advert accused of racist messages which has been spread across the internet today, demonstrates just how easy it is to gain bad publicity. 

One can hardly be surprised over the accusation. Personally, I understood two messages from the advert:

·         Dove body wash will make you lighter

·         Dove body wash will make you thinner   

Dove has however denied the claims with a public statement stating that "All three women are intended to demonstrate the ‘after’ product benefit... The ad is intended to illustrate the benefits of using Dove VisibleCare Body Wash, by making skin visibly more beautiful in just one week." The company also addressed the apparent misunderstanding on their Facebook site, encouraging fans to share their thoughts about the advertisement.  

This is not the only PR misdemeanor the company has encountered. Only in 2008 was Dove accused of destroying rain-forests in Indonesia, and just last year the company was criticized for a "not so real beauty" model description for their Real Beauty Campaign. 

Dove knows its market and many will argue that the advert was an honest mistake with no intention of causing offence. From a PR perspective, however, the advert has brought more interest to Dove than any other of their recent campaigns, with no long-term damage done to the company.

Bad planning or deliberate attempt to create publicity? I will leave you to judge that.

Why FTSE 100 companies are falling behind on digital comms

Today’s public relations professionals build most of their relationships online. The emergence of social media and public relations’ management of its tools, has provided a whole new sphere for relationship management. Building trustworthy and transparent exchange relationships is now more important than ever. Social media is used every day to communicate with customers, respond to questions, or to publicise clients. Social networking sites such as Facebook and LinkedIn, blogging sites such as Blogger, and micro-blogging sites such as Twitter have become a crucial part of the PR toolkit.

Strange as it is, however, though there is little to no evidence that embracing social media should offer anything but benefits, the majority of FTSE 100 companies have still not fully engaged in the use of social media activities. Small companies, on the other hand, are readily engaging with their stakeholders online.

Radley Yelder, a London based communications company, found that sixty of the FTSE100 companies did not display their link to social media sites on their homepage, despite engaging in at least one of the major sites.  Moreover, they identified that only twenty-nine of the companies had a corporate page on Facebook. Of these, only sixteen of the active Facebook users actually updated their profiles with fresh content weekly; and just nineteen attempted to actively engage with their page audiences.  Why the larger companies are not as willing to engage with their stakeholders online could have several explanations.

Perhaps, budgets and timings do not allow the PR personnel to actively engage with their stakeholders online...

Or could it be that the larger companies are not really committed to engage in open and transparent dialogue?

Making Social Media History: William, Kate and Osama Bin Laden

What striking feature does William, Kate and Osama Bin Laden have in common?


Yes, they have all been married. Yes, they are all world famous.Yes, they are all religious.Yes, they are all passionate about world affairs.Yes, they all have famous friends.Yes, they're all fans of head-wear.Yes, they are all keen to avoid journalists.Yes, they have all hired people under them to carry out the dirty work.Yes, they all have armed bodyguards.Yes, they have all featured on condom covers.


However, non of the above is the correct answer to my question.


According to US magazine ADweek, the marriage of William and Kate and the death of Osama Bin Laden had one striking similarity: they were massive live news events that were extensively followed online, crushing all previous records.


Lost me at the condom covers? Have a look at this and this.


On the day of Osama's death, there were over two million online references to his name online. The Royal Wedding alone, had just under 1.9 million mentions. Osama attracted more online attention overall and both were subject to massive amounts of tweets; the Royal Wedding  beating Osama with 240,000.


The Royal Wedding, however, could not beat how the news of Osama's death was spread. Just as many of us remeber where we were when we heard about the World Trade Centre attack, many will remember where they were when they heard about the death of Osama Bin Laden.


For many, that place was on Twitter.


It has been reported that it all began when Donald Rumsfeld’s former chief of staff, Keith Urban tweeted: “So I’m told by a reputable person they have killed Osama bin Laden. Hot damn.” Another less famous person, however, became the real Twitter sensation at the breaking of the Osama news.


What does William, Kate, Osama Bin Laden and an unknown Pakistani IT consultant have in common?


Yes, I have just added another person to the equation. He does not feature on a condom cover, has no famous friends, no armed bodyguards and has to do the dirty work all by himself.


Sohaib Athar aka @reallyvirtual, is an IT consultant living in Abbottabad, Pakistan.


Just like William, Kate and Osama, Sohaib made social media history, using Twitter to share what he heard as helicopters swooping down on a compound.


His first Tweet read:  "Helicopter hovering above Abbottabad at 1am (is a rare event).” At the time, Sohaib only had around 750 followers and used Twitter to chat with people about news, his family, technology and politics. After Obama's announcement on Sunday, just 24 hours later, he was broadcasting his thoughts to 86,000 followers.


Moral of the story? While it took traditional news media such as CNN a while to verify and report the death of Osama Bin Laden,  the news was already widely talked about on social media networks such as Twitter. 


You don't have to be royal or a terrorist  to make social media history. All it takes, is to be at the right place, at the right time- and to write about it.  


Recommended: The Art of Breaking News on Social Media