Two weeks after Toyota announced the recall of an estimated 8 million vehicles worldwide due to a sticky accelerator problem, some rear guard PR work has surfaced in the form a video apology from the company’s US President & COO, Jim Lenz.
Two versions have been created, one on a recall website page, accompanying a formal letter of apology and a longer, stranger version on YouTube that includes promotional clips of Toyota models, zooming photos of the USA HQ and cars being made in the factory, presumably cut from an old corporate video.
Watching Jim Lenz explain that he wouldn’t put his family and friends in a Toyota if they weren’t safe is reminiscent of MP John Gummer feeding that beefburger to his 4 year old daughter at the height of the UK BSE crisis in 1990.
In the US, Toyota’s reaction to the crisis has also been criticised for being too late and too centralised, not allowing local dealers to communicate quickly with their customers or enabling a dialogue online. Toyota’s general Facebook page, which has 70,000 fans, presumably mostly customers, directs enquiries to their static website recall page. More »
While the New Orleans Saints and Indianapolis Colts will square up for Super Bowl XLIV on February 6th, Coke and Pepsi are already into a social media skirmish with the 100 million viewer event of the US advertising year as a backdrop.
Pepsi are not advertising for the first time in 23 years at Super Bowl, diverting activity into their Pepsi Refresh campaign, centered around a Facebook organised offline treasure hunt backed with poster and TV tie-ins, aiming to raise $20 million for local charities around the world.
Coke, who launch their social media campaign‘Live Positively’ on Facebook today, is donating a dollar to Boys & Girls Clubs of America for every invite sent to a friend – up to a maximum of $250,000. Participants are rewarded with a 20 second sneak preview of their one off special ad, featuring the Simpsons, the full version to be played at the Super Bowl. More »
So now there’s a Hitler parody ranting at all the other Hitler parodies on YouTube, this meme craze must surely have eaten itself now, unless someone creates a parody of a parody of a parody, but that would be ridiculous..
Although 75 million people had signed up for a Twitter account by the end of 2009, only 17 percent sent even a single Tweet in December ’09, an all-time low for the micro-blogging service, research from RJMetrics has found.
Overall, in the three years since it began, 40% of Twitter account holders have never sent one Tweet and 80% have sent less than ten.
Despite the high percentage of inactive users, Robert Moore of RJMetrics observed that 17 percent of 75 million people still translates to a large number and the study found “tremendous loyalty and engagement from those Twitter users who stay on the system after their first week.”
Among the study’s other findings: Twitter is currently signing up about 6.2 million new members a month, down from a July 2009 peak of 7.8 million a month and the average Twitter user has 27 followers, down from 42 followers in August 2009.
Sunny Queen eggs of Australia has launched a PR campaign that takes aim at the British, asking consumers if they should replace the traditional Sunny Queen egg smile with a frown and rename the brand ‘Whinging Pom Eggs’
The campaign created by BCM includes print, online and a Facebook page, along with a spoof news report claiming the British have a ‘whinging gene’.
Leveraging the ‘whinging pom’ stereotype has a history in Australian advertising. M&C Saatchi created the ‘Poms will whinge’ campaign for British Council Scholarships four years ago which was banned by The Advertising Standards Board.
Pope Benedict XVI has spoken about the importance of new digital channels in an address on the Vatican’s YouTube channel.
In a sixty second clip, he urges followers to make use of “the resources made available by the digital age in which we live” describing it as “the urgent and unavoidable task” in the build up to The 44th World Day of Social Communications on May 16.
On his Pope2you website, the Pope’s Facebook, iphone application and YouTube channel, ‘The Vatican’ are evidence of his enthusiastic adoption of new media, though he is not yet on Twitter.
Personally I’d never heard of Jenny Craig until this week – apparently the weight loss company is a player in the $40billion US diet industry – and one that’s about to get bigger, thanks to the publicity the market leader, Weight Watchers is handing it by way of a lawsuit.
The employment of lawyers to fight publicity battles is almost always a bad move. You wouldn’t ask a PR agent to defend you in court, why employ a lawyer to handle publicity? Tiger Woods did it recently and that’s turning out well isn’t it.
Even if the Jenny Craig claims are deemed misleading in court, dieters won’t care really, it’s mere semantics, they’ll give it a go anyway and in far higher numbers than if Weight Watchers hadn’t drawn attention to them in the first place.
If you look at the offending ad below, Weight Watchers isn’t even mentioned, they say only ‘the largest weight loss program.’ Now everyone knows exactly which brand is allegedly half as good as Jenny Craig while before it was oblique. More »
YouTube has announced it’s going into the movie rental business, starting with five films from the Sundance Film Festival, available from January 31st.
YouTube says it is reacting to movie maker requests for a finance model online that doesn’t rely on advertising – which doesn’t always fit their distribution and monetisation needs.
The Google Inc. owned company indicated that this is the beginning of an expansive plan to offer movie makers a new way of managing the distribution of their films.
“These are early days and in the coming weeks we’ll also invite a small group of partners across other industries, in addition to independent film, to participate in this new option”, YouTube said on their blog.
Google, which has struggled to make a profitable business out of YouTube after buying it in 2006 for $1.65 billion, may see pay-per-view as its best bet to grow revenues. More »
Interesting title for Gordon Ramsay’s comeback on C4 last night – no doubt the double meaning is not lost on Gordon Ramsay Holdings, in this first attempt at reputation escapology after “a shitty year” as he puts it at the start of the programme.
So Gordon’s gone to India on a culinary and personal journey to learn about authentic Indian food and show a different side to the sweary alpha-chef – a more humble, vulnerable, willing-to-learn Ramsay.
It’s an odd choice, a bit like Michael Winner seeking public redemption by reviewing kebab houses. Ramsay does genuinely seem at times appalled, deflated and out of sorts, the manic mannerisms are still there, the direct questions, but in languid India, where he’s definitely not in charge, the hyper Ramsay presenting style doesn’t quite work. More »
Two weeks after Toyota announced the recall of an estimated 8 million vehicles worldwide due to a sticky accelerator problem, some rear guard PR work has surfaced in the form a video apology from the company’s US President & COO, Jim Lenz.
While the New Orleans Saints and Indianapolis Colts will square up for Super Bowl XLIV on February 6th, Coke and Pepsi are already into a social media skirmish with the 100 million viewer event of the US advertising year as a backdrop.
Although 75 million people had signed up for a Twitter account by the end of 2009, only 17 percent sent even a single Tweet in December ’09, an all-time low for the micro-blogging service, research from RJMetrics has found.
Personally I’d never heard of Jenny Craig until this week – apparently the weight loss company is a player in the $40billion US diet industry – and one that’s about to get bigger, thanks to the publicity the market leader, Weight Watchers is handing it by way of a lawsuit.
YouTube has announced it’s going into the movie rental business, starting with five films from the Sundance Film Festival, available from January 31st.
Interesting title for Gordon Ramsay’s comeback on C4 last night – no doubt the double meaning is not lost on Gordon Ramsay Holdings, in this first attempt at reputation escapology after “a shitty year” as he puts it at the start of the programme.