Public relations

Using social media to announce bankruptcy

Posted at February 16, 2011 // Public relations, Web

Social media has became a company’s best tool in disaster management. Borders advised their loyal customers via Facebook and Twitter regarding their reorganization the same day it was filed.

Wall Street Journal reported on this pending bankruptcy last week. So, it isn’t new news to the inside circle. However, to many Borders consumers, the social media postings are likely to represent breaking news. Social media is also allowing Borders to continue to communicate with their core consumers as the proceedings evolves. It also gave Borders an avenue to communicate important information such as store closing. During such a difficult time, it also gave Borders a way to continue to build good will and retain loyal consumers to the best of its abilities. A quick glance on Borders twitter stream shows numerous personal replies. Social media gave Borders the opportunity to continuously engage, and to address (or potentially discover) any consumer concerns.

Social media is now an essential tool for any public relations effort. It’s particularly helpful in incidents where events are continuously changing, and you need a way to communicate with your most loyal consumers with the latest and greatest. Traditional media cannot be compared with social media in its ability to respond quickly. News is on TV three times a day. Newspaper comes out once a day. Tweets can be posted continuously.

Click here to view a few screenshots of Borders effort.

Tags : Facebook, Social media, Twitter

Groupon spectacularly did what so many others have done

Posted at February 6, 2011 // Advertising, Public relations

The most controversial commercial coming out of this year’s Super Bowl is definitely the Groupon commercial. It stars Timonthy Hutton explaining the political problems that’s Tibetans are experiencing, but that didn’t stop him from enjoying yummy Tibetan food, at a discount thanks to Groupon. It’s widely judged as culturally insensitive. Mere three hours after airing, multiple copies of the commercial is on YouTube. And the dislike to like ratio is at approximately 10:1. Groupon released two additional commercials online with similar mockumentary tone, on the subject of deforestation / waxing and whale extinction / whale watching cruise. These less known commercials are at a dislike to like ratio of about 2:1.

Here is the Timonthy Hutton version:

And one of the highest rated comments on YouTube for this commercial reads as follows:

Wow, this is fucking offensive.

“Millions of jews were murdered through starvation at Auschwitz… but that doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy this GREAt brisket at Katz’s Delicatessen, thanks to Groupon!”

I actually used to like Groupon. Fuck off now. Use Living Social, its better anyway.

(thumbs up this)

crock703 3 hours ago 112 thumbs up

As social media strategist Rohit Bhargava tweeted: “Groupon seems to have achieved the unique feat of paying $3M to lose customers who previously loved them.”

Many are comparing Groupon’s current situation to Kenneth Cole’s imprudent tweet invoking the Egypt uprising to promote their Spring collection. Since the tweet, Kenneth Cole has issued an apology. I await to see if Groupon will take similar actions, but I doubt it.

Reasons being that the Groupon commercials were actually really well-executed. Here is the concept of Groupon’s “Save The Money” campaign, according to Groupon CEO Andrew Mason:

When groups of people act together to do something, it’s usually to help a cause. With Groupon, people act together to help themselves by getting great deals. So what if we did a parody of a celebrity-narrated, PSA-style commercial that you think is about some noble cause (such as “Save the Whales”), but then it’s revealed to actually be a passionate call to action to help yourself (as in “Save the Money”)?

The TV commercials has an online presence SaveTheMoney.org. Now, it’s unclear exactly how would you know about this website. It’s not featured on the commercials. It is on the Groupon homepage. If you click on the sidebar where that invites you to check out the Super Bowl spots, it would take you to this website.

SaveTheMoney.org’s sole purpose as it exists now is to host the TV commercials, AND to give you an opportunity to donate! Under Timothy Hutton’s Tibetan restaurant spot is a button to donate to the Tibet Fund. Under Cuba Gooding, Jr’s whale-watching cruise spot is a button to donate to Greenpeace. Under Elizabeth Hurley’s waxing spot is a button to donate to the Rainforest Action Network. On top of it all, Groupon will match the donations.

So, all in all, Groupon’s commercials are doing great things! It’s creative. It’s charitable.

So, what went wrong?

Groupon committed a crime many other brands have committed in the past. They just happened fail far more spectacularly. They were talking to themselves, instead of the audience.

Super Bowl is a forum to reach the masses, which Groupon understood. Andrew Mason said on the company blog:

This year, we realized that in spite of how much we’d grown, a ton of people still hadn’t heard of Groupon, so we decided to give in to our Napoleon complex and invade the rest of the world with a proper Super Bowl commercial.

However, the masses is not going to take the time to research the commercials as I did for this post. Even though no doubt that the controversial commercials will generate extra media coverage. It’s questionable how much of this coverage will reach the general public that Groupon is so desperately trying to reach. The masses will take the commercials at its face value. And, at face value, Groupon mocked some serious issues. Why did they do that? Again, we look at the blog post:

The trouble was figuring out what to do and with whom to work. We had tried working with creative agencies before and had never been that impressed. Our peculiar taste in humor made it really hard for outside agencies to come up with concepts we liked. This time around, we had better luck with the ad firm Crispin Porter + Bogusky. We really admired some of the work that CP+B had done in the past, so we gave them a shot at pitching us concepts, and they came up with an idea we couldn’t resist blowing millions of dollars on.

The key sentence being “Our peculiar taste in humor made it really hard for outside agencies to come up with concepts we liked.”

The problem is the audience for a Super Bowl commercial is not Groupon employees. The audience is the masses. This concept fails to resonate with the general American public.

So, learn from Groupon. Next time you’re creating a marketing message (an ad, a flyer, a resume), ask yourself:

Is this message designed to appeal to me or to my audience?

Email subscribers: YouTube video link

Click here to check out more post-game analysis.

Update (2/7/2011): Groupon issued an explanation on company blog. Groupon is going to redo the commercials to have a more obvious call-to-action to support the charities. However, as many readers noted, nowhere in the explanation was an apology, which further infuriates some users. Groupon insists that their commercials were good, better than those that objectify women (read: GoDaddy.com). Users generally agree that better than bad doesn’t make it good and Groupon is setting the bar far too low…

Groupon’s Controversial Super Bowl Ad (huffingtonpost.com)
Groupon’s Offensive Tibet Ad Is Also Unfunny [Video] (gawker.com)
Save The Money: Groupon’s Super Bowl Ads May Spark Faux Outrage (techcrunch.com)

Tags : Groupon, Super Bowl advertising

Logo updates vs Logo changes

Posted at January 7, 2011 // Advertising, Promotion, Public relations, Retail, Strategy / Tactics, Web

As as a coffee addict, I’ve been following the conversation on the new Starbucks logo, and have been doing a quick study on logo designs in general. Many have commented on the logo, particularly on the removal of the brand name. As with any changes, many wanted no part of it and called for the old logo to return.

Due to the timing, many have been predicting the fate of the new Starbuck logo based on recent memory of Gap’s logo disaster. Many are already planning the going-away of this new Starbuck logo. However, I would say that is unlikely.

There is updating the logo for relevance. There there is changing the logo. The Gap incident was closer to the latter. Gap walked away from using blue as the fundamental look and feel to white. The little blue box in the now defunct new Gap logo was a nod to the original design, but it remained to be too far of a departure.

Some argued that the level of outcry depends on the level of brand loyalty. I have no doubt that there is great truth in this argument. However, one can’t possibly assert that a brand with high consumer loyalty can never updating their logo. Many brands have done so successfully. Pepsi for example. Per the New Coke experiment, we all know how loyal cola drinkers are. Nevertheless, Pepsi was able roll out their logo successfully, despite the always present dissenting opinion of a few. Pepsi’s logo an update of the old, and not a drastic departure in design.

Considering that the siren remained to be the hero of the new Starbucks logo, and despite going one-tone, Starbucks chose to stay with the iconic green that’s be in market since 1987. I think this logo will thrive. However, this logo update, along with those done in the past, does teach us a few more lessons on logo and branding. Stay tuned.

Photo Credit: Starbucks logos via Starbucks.com. Gap logos via cnn.com. Pepsi logos via bevreview.com ®/™ Trademarks owned by Starbucks Corporation, Gap, Inc, and Pepsi, Inc respectively.