Currie Communications

By Mark Paterson, Managing Director

You know that your media tactic has become part of the pop culture zeitgeist when Sesame Street parodies your work.

That’s what happened to Old Spice’s hugely successful The man your man could smell like advertisement on Youtube Old Spice The man your man could smell like (22 million views).

Here’s Sesame Street’s parody, Smell like a monster, featuring the puppet, Grover, on a horse, err, sorry, cow Sesame Street Smell like a monster (4.7m views, to date).

Now, Microsoft has brought the video talent Isaiah Mustafa to Australia this week to promote Windows new phone Old spice guy comes to Australia

It seems impressive, right?

Isaiah is clearly an ‘it’ guy. He is set to star in a film with Jennifer Aniston of Friends fame and no doubt will do a heavy round of TV appearances in Australia. He’s at Bondi Beach today.

Yet, how well has this execution worked for the brand?

Reportedly, there was a 107% increase in sales for Old Spice during June 2010. What? Do you mean to tell me the social media hit of 2010 managed to only double sales of the product.

Crikey, what does this say about the effectiveness of viral (social) media?

I don’t have all the data, including the value of sales growth and the change in market share, to reach a well-informed conclusion as to how cost-effective this tactic has been for Old Spice.

Yet, I expect there are many ‘old media’ people, including advertising maverick John Singleton, who would guarantee a higher growth in sales for a tactic seen by 22 million sets of eyeballs.

As for Microsoft, I’m curious to see what tactics they employ to extract a return from the investment they’ve made in a character that many people associate with a different product, altogether.

ps How do you counter a raging campaign that’s gone viral? The latest billboard for competing deodorant Axe declares that its scent is “for men who’d rather be with a woman than on a horse”. deodorant wars

By Katrina Walter, Senior Consultant

Grand Final day 2010. I was vomiting. Not from too much alcohol but some dodgy dining the previous night.
Everyone was out having fun and there I was listening to the game on a radio next to my bed, in and out of consciousness.

I remember hearing an old INXS song, bits of the first quarter and falling asleep. I woke at about the five-minute mark of the last quarter. When one of the commentators said, “cancel your holiday plans,” I thought what does that mean? and when Nick Maxwell, the Collingwood captain spoke at the end, I could clearly hear his exhaustion.

As the voices from the radio were my only contact with the big day, it was a powerful experience.
It made me think about how well I listen and how much I miss when I don’t listen as intently as I did last weekend.

I, for one, think there’s a market for better listening products and tools. I would say every aspect of the communication process can be improved by better listening whether it is taking briefs, chatting with journalists or in meetings.

We concentrate so much on making people better speakers or writers rather than making them better listeners.

I thought about the act of listening and people who I think listen to me and those that don’t. Patterns started to form so I gave them names…sound familiar?

‘Story finishers’ – when people think they already know what you are going to say, before you actually finish what you say. They try and cut you off or complete the sentence for you. If this could be you, next time let people finish, the main point might surprise.

‘It’s a competition’ – some people love to argue. If they don’t, perhaps they think people won’t respect them? These people are compelled to challenge every point you are making, even if sometimes I am sure they agree with you. Discussion then becomes a contest, rather than as a way to learn something new.

‘Impress me’ – often people you are in conversation with want to impress you because they like you or want to work with you so rather than fully listen to what you say, they use the time you are talking to think about something interesting to say back to you instead of focusing on listening.

So, wherever you are this Saturday and beyond, I encourage you to practise better listening.

By Susan McNair, Director Client Service

I watched with interest the National Press Club debates that ran during the Federal election campaign.

But in all honesty, they were dull.

Well-rehearsed lines were trotted out repeatedly, with little regard to what was actually asked. Answers were laden with government and corporate jargon – and a smattering of ‘fair dinkums’ – and often required extreme concentration to decipher. And the delivery of these ‘key messages’ was largely flat, monotonous and grey.

It’s a blight which plagued the later months of Kevin Rudd’s time in the hot seat. His use of baffling and complex language was widely- criticised, and encouraged the odd, and equally as contrived, inclusion of ‘Australianisms’. The lack of intonation, let alone emotion, in his speech was also ridiculed.

It’s a trap that almost all our politicians (although admittedly not to the same extent as Mr Rudd) continue to fall into.

It seems being a wordsmith or an orator is no longer a prerequisite for being a leader.

In forgoing a mastery of language, in order to present a carefully-crafted persona, politicians have lost the ability to guarantee people are listening. Their words and their delivery are bland and wash without impact over the public.

In an attempt to control their stories, the interest, the life, the vitality, has disappeared from their language.

As a former journalist, a lover of words, I’m a culprit, too, of falling into tedious, lifeless, witless, dull language.

But recently language has been revived as a source of fascination to me. Words have once again truly inspired me, riled me, defeated me, had me laughing out loud.

But they have not been words from those who are paid to lead and inspire, but those of my three- year--old boy who is tumbling with gusto into learning the power of language.

It’s a lesson worth considering in relation to the role of communications. In engaging the services of a public relations advisor, clients need not resign themselves to the bland.

There’s much about communication we can learn from the average three- year- old, namely:

Be brave.

Be honest.

Be direct.

And you will be heard.

By Julia Balderstone, Senior Consultant

Timeliness, perhaps more than any other single factor, seems to be the main driver of news value in the 2010 federal election campaign.

The pressure on Sky News to compete against its fledgling rival, the ABC’s 24-hour news channel, has created an obsession with “going live” to provide the latest from the campaign trail.

Last week Sky chose to devote almost seven minutes of viewer time just to capture would-be reporter Mark Latham waiting to pose his questions to Tony Abbott. When it finally did come about, the encounter was a complete anti-climax and lasted for little more than 90 seconds.

And Sky News is not alone.

The media cycle is now so fast that many traditional journalists are forced to ditch their pens and become amateur camera operators so they can post vision on websites in an attempt to gazump the nightly TV bulletins.

No wonder, there is so little time in media coverage devoted to policy analysis and reaction. When you have competing on-line services, two 24-hour TV news channels and an avalanche of tweeting, the very existence of “a story of the day” is almost an anachronism.

And while the personalities and polls provide quick headlines and catchy, throw-away lines for media, the community is left feeling bamboozled as to what headline to see or hear, let alone believe.

For example, this past weekend, do we accept The Age’s “Labor surge as Abbott’s approval falls”, The Weekend Australian’s “ALP fight back in key marginals”, or the Sunday Herald Sun’s poll, which screams “Huge swing to Abbott”?

This obsession with immediacy – assisted by innovative, new technologies and changing consumer habits – threatens to deny voters of  coherent and meaningful messages about policy.

By Craig Little, Senior Consultant.

About $10 million a week will be pumped into political advertising during the Federal Election over the next five weeks.

While more of this will find its way to Google, Yahoo!, YouTube, Facebook and Twitter than before, the early signs suggest that where the big money goes, innovation and creativity do not necessarily follow.

Instead we have a play-it-safe, small-target start to the campaign.

Perhaps this is symptomatic of how quickly the gloss came off brand Kevin07, as well as the fact there is no long-term incumbent and the pledge for “new leadership” is implied with two leaders making their campaign debuts.

That both campaigns are being driven by 1980’s industry veterans, fuelled with large budgets, increases the likelihood that election campaigning will not be “moving forward” during 2010.

Whatever the reason, a campaign sans catchy slogan¹, iconic imagery and significant creative use of the online space, is a dull campaign – and a narrow one.

This is a shame, as when done well campaigning in the online space is cheaper and more responsive to short-time frames. It can create discussion and leverage editorial content on the online (as well as print and TV) news sites.

Although given World Vision CEO Tim Costello’s effort to leverage the incredible success of the recent Old Spice viral campaign, perhaps we should be grateful Julia and Tony are playing it safe.

1:“moving forward” is not catchy… although very few slogans lend themselves to such repetition

By Nicola Raymond, Senior Consultant

“It’s what some call xxx, and others agree.” 

I recently came across this sentence as part of an opinion editorial in a major Australian newspaper and found myself immediately infuriated by its vagueness.

Who are the “some” and these “others” that agree? And how many of them are there?

It’s something that I’ve encountered all too often in newspapers, and each time I see it, it brings me back to a pet topic of mine: detailed statistics.

I didn’t excel at mathematics in school, but I do love statistics. Any statistic that backs-up a claim and offers a comparative analysis appeals to me.

For example, I recently read that the Australian beef industry plays an important role in Australia’s society and economy.

I didn’t find that information alone particularly informative, so I did some statistical research, and here’s what I found.

“There are 27 million head of beef cattle in Australia. The total area operated by beef farms is 332 million hectares, which is 43% of Australia’s total land mass. Australia is the second-largest exporter of beef in the world, behind Brazil.”

This gave me a framework for understanding and accepting that the Australian beef industry is, indeed, important to the nation’s society and its economy.

Often we need statistical comparisons to help to get a message across.

For example, the statement “Australians consume an average 32.5 kilograms per capita of beef annually” gives us a statistic. But what does it mean? We need a comparison with other countries to understand this.

Finding out, then, that “Australians consume 32.5kg per capita of beef annually, compared with 17kg per person in the UK and 63kg per person in Argentina,” gives me the information I need to make sense of this consumption.

Sometimes, without statistical evidence, a story can seem fabricated or discriminatory, the source appearing to make arbitrary claims, even though what they say may be true.

The bottom line: messages in the media are often conveyed through long lines of communication. In order that a message is interpreted and passed on, statistical evidence is one way of achieving cut-through.

I call it commonsense.

By Katrina Walter,  Senior Consultant

Did you quit Facebook on May 31?  There was plenty of push and reminders to do so across all mainstream media outlets as well as Facebook pages dedicated to it.

I didn’t. I thought about it but like all vices, there is something about the voyeurism that kept me with an active account.  It is also really hard to quit, have you tried?

When you go to your account settings, you’re given an option to deactivate your account, which turns out not to be the same thing as deleting it. Deleting is a process that is well hidden and takes about five different pages but, now so many people have raised the issue, the message is starting to spread.

There are many reasons to stop using Facebook. The major one and the key reason for the ‘Quit Facebook Day’ is the site’s complete war on privacy. Facebook’s management don’t care about people’s privacy and they even say so in its terms of service. Facebook states that not only do they own your data (section 2.1), but if you don’t keep it up to date and accurate (section 4.6), they can terminate your account (section 14).

As one blogger puts it, “they see their customers as unpaid employees for crowd-sourcing ad-targeting data.”

I know the Facebook management is not driven by goodwill and so do most people. Zuckerberg didn’t set it up just for you to find your old school friends and lost lovers, he had world domination in mind. Facebook is often used poorly especially in the numerous cases of cyber bullying but it is also used well – to generate public awareness and debate about grassroot issues (such as saving a live venue from inappropriate licensing rules) and to educate people about international politics (Tehran elections).

All the attention Facebook is getting about its mismanagement of people’s data and arrogance is a good thing – it needs to lift its game to secure its long term success and flagging goodwill.

By Jenny Littewood, Director, Strategy

W.C. Fields once said, “Never work with children or animals”, but he was an actor, not a photographer or TV producer.

In our world of media relations, children and animals are vital ingredients (sorry!) and certainly do help to sell a story as demonstrated by our work on FarmDay.

For the last four years we’ve been promoting this national not-for-profit initiative established by Deb Bain, a sheep and wool producer from Skipton in Victoria. Her aim is to connect city families with farming families so that they can learn first-hand where their food and fibre comes from.

Rural and regional media have always been keen supporters of the event – they see a greater relevance particularly if a local farmer is hosting a city family.

Gaining the attention of metro media has been much more challenging and has required many different angles and pitches – some have worked, others haven’t.

We don’t delude ourselves, FarmDay is what we call a ‘soft story’. We also know newsrooms, producers, chiefs of staff and picture editors are inundated with approaches, many from PR companies like ours.

So how have we generated coverage for FarmDay in metro media? In the space I have here I can’t detail our communications strategy of course but I can share with you the three ‘Ps’.

Persistence certainly plays a big part. We might be knocked back by the producer on one radio show but that won’t stop us pitching to another.

Personalising the information to the media outlet rather than sending generic material also pays huge dividends we find.

And lastly, in the case of FarmDay, is pictures. Yes, the tabloid media still loves a great photo of children and animals as illustrated in yesteray’s Herald Sun!

By Alessandra  Malvermi, Sound PR*

More than 14,000 women and men wearing sparkling pink ponchos scrambled onto Australia’s most famous sporting arena, the Melbourne Cricket Ground, last Friday to form a giant pink lady silhouette.

The silhouette represented the pink logo for the Breast Cancer Network Australia (BCNA), one of Australia’s most widely-known, non-profit organisations. The men and women who took to the field (supporters, friends, survivors) were part of an extraordinary event which recognises all Australians diagnosed with breast cancer.

The event is a great example of a successful brand and consensus promotion. It shows the importance of creating a big idea and giving people something interesting to talk about.

Yet, as extraordinary as the event was, it does not alone make a campaign.

These type of promotional events can become a waste of time and effort, if they are not established on a solid communication platform. It’s critical, indeed, to define clear objectives and messages, build a solid strategy. Any event, as extraordinary as it may be, is always a medium. It is neither the goal nor the campaign.

Fortunately, the BCNA understands this important communications rule. As a result, the organisation’s strategic and integrated campaign of ambassadors, media publicity, web activity and events, including the giant pink lady silhouette, has been able to generate extensive media coverage and stakeholder interest across all mediums.

http://www.linkedin.com/redirect?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Efieldofwomenlive%2Eorg%2Eau&urlhash=jSHR

* Alessandra  Malvermi is principal of Sound PR, Milan, our affiliate agency in Italy. Sound PR is a member agency of the Public Relations Global Network (www.prgn.com). Visit Sound PR at http://www.soundpr.it/

By Craig Little, Senior Consultant

At the turn of the 21^st Century, British Petroleum (BP) launched a $220 million public relations and advertising campaign to re-brand itself as the world’s greenest oil company.

WPP Group’s Ogilvy & Mather ‘Beyond Petroleum’ campaign paid off.  It was praised by consumer business press as a prescient model of corporate social responsibility and won the Gold Award from the American Marketing Association.  In 2007 it was found by a customer survey to have provided BP with the most environmentally-friendly image of any major oil company.

But an award-winning, multi-million-dollar, green-branding campaign can’t fortify BP against the environmental (and public relations) catastrophe unfolding from the company’s Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico.

Negative media has been extensive and sustained after outlets belatedly devoted lead coverage to the story more than a week after the leak first occurred.  That the increase in coverage coincided with the increased visibility of the oil spill is no coincidence – and an arguably foreseeable consequence when you’re haemorrhaging approximately 800,000 litres of crude each day (the worst case scenario is well beyond that figure).

Also haemorrhaging is BP’s ‘Beyond Petroleum’ re-branding investment – something that may have been prevented for a fraction of the cost.

Less ads and media releases, more mitigation on safety

One quarter of one percent of BP’s public relations and advertising campaign spend ($550,000) would have equipped the Deepwater Horizon rig with a remote-control acoustic trigger – a back-up system that would close the underwater well even if the rig above were destroyed, as happened on 20 April. 

Such a trigger, while not foolproof, may have been the best chance to prevent the leak.  It would have allowed workers escaping from the burning rig by boat to send a remote signal 1,500 metres below the water’s surface to close the valve and stop the oil. Oil producing countries such as Norway and Brazil require these triggers as added precaution for rigs of their coasts.  Everywhere else – including the United States and Australia – it is voluntary. 

Three years after BP launched their $200 million re-branding campaign, the US Interior Department’s Mineral Management Service considered mandating the triggers.  They decided against it after pressure from oil companies, including BP, who complained the $550,000 devices were too burdensome.

The oppressive cost of inaction

If $550,000 proved burdensome to BP, the potential costs as a result of the spill will be outright oppressive.

The prospective economic implications of the disaster are gargantuan — albeit highly uncertain. According to the Harte Research Institute for Gulf of Mexico Studies, the annual commercial seafood harvest in the gulf is $727 million, recreational fishing contributes $832 million and nearly 8,000 jobs, and tourism related to wildlife adds $569 million.

It remained unclear on Monday (May 3) how much damage those industries will incur from the oil spill, and how long that damage will last. The research group estimates that $1.76 billion in annual economic activity is tied to the wetlands directly exposed to the spill.

Much of BP’s time and resources will be required to address claims that are likely to be in the thousands – legitimate and otherwise. Tony Hayward, BP’s chief executive, reiterated a promise that BP “will honour all legitimate claims for business interruption”.  Asked for examples of illegitimate claims, he said: “I could give you lots of examples. This is America — come on. We’re going to have lots of illegitimate claims. We all know that.”

The negative press is not limited to the nature of the oil spill.  Some of the facts exposed in sections of the media following the explosion of the Deepwater rig do not flatter BP’s environmental credentials – credentials inconsistent with the key messages of the $220 million ‘Beyond Petroleum’ campaign.

Last year BP cut its investment in alternative sources by 28.5 per cent – from $1.54 billion to a little over $1 billion. 

In announcing its first quarter results for 2010, BP reported that only about $770 million of a revenue figure of $81 billion was from alternate energy sources.

Toxic government relations

Not only has BP’s environmental credentials taken a hit, so too has its relationship with the US Government.  Having played a role in willing the Interior Department’s Mineral Management Service not to mandate remote control triggers, it now finds itself in the gun of the Obama administration and a Democratic senate.

The Obama administration’s language towards BP has been strong – it has vowed to “keep a boot on the throat” of BP to ensure the corporation is held accountable for the spill. Concerned about what compensation BP is willing to pay, a group of Democratic senators have introduced legislation to raise oil companies’ liability limit retroactively to $US10 billion (in response to a law passed after the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill requiring companies to pay for cleanup costs but no more than $US75 million for other damage).

The emperor’s new clothes

In the absence of business practices that reflect a brand, public relations is little more than the emperor’s new clothes and speaks of an organisation more prone to corporate vanity than legitimately realigning its business.

Had BP made major investments into alternative energy and had they rigorously alleviated against the risks of fossil fuel, the “Beyond Petroleum” campaign would’ve played a vital role in building the new BP brand and its credibility with consumers.

Such credibility (and the ability to demonstrate all measures of mitigation were put in place) is vital when ‘protecting the brand’ against a crisis such as the catastrophic oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and would’ve justified the $220 million spend several times over. 

BP’s exposed lack of credibility is likely to cost significantly more. 

1. Landor “ImagePower Green Brands Survey” reported that BP was regarded as more green (21 per cent) than Shell (15 per cent), Chevron (13 per cent), ExxonMobil (11 per cent) and Texaco (9 per cent).  BP also topped the survey of companies that had “become more green” in the last five years.