BrainStorm

Gawker Media is one of the many sites we monitor for news and trends (did you catch Tom Cruise’s recent rant about Scientology?…that’s a PR lesson of its own.) He’s bringing crazy back for real.

Anyway, I came across this gem of “how not to handle PR” from Target.

Gawker reports, “It seems some bloggers are a tad vexed over the department store giant’s new advertisement (also giant, and in Times Square) featuring a young woman in a spread-eagled position over the company’s logo. One of them sent a letter to Target complaining about what she sees as the predominant depiction of women in marketing campaigns arranged in, well, vag-evoking poses.”Here is Target’s brilliant response:

Good Morning Amy,

Thank you for contacting Target; unfortunately we are unable to respond to your inquiry because Target does not participate with non-traditional media outlets. This practice is in place to allow us to focus on publications that reach our core guest.

Once again thank you for your interest, and have a nice day.

I shouldn’t be surprise because we hang our hat on the ability to educate corporate clients on the unreal benefits of embracing social media and how when used effectively it can build real, impenetrable, and long-lasting relationships with consumers, media and influencers.

Call us Target, we’ll be waiting.

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In a transparent world of checks and balances (read: be authentic or someone, somewhere on the blog-o-sphere will catch you in the act) it is fascinating to me how corporate marketing efforts can backfire. The most recent stink involves Dove’s so called viral video “Onslaught” campaign. (As a side note - I don’t think a professionally produced, PR pushed, heavily marketed video by an ad agency should ever be called “Viral”). The campaign itself is admirable in the sense that it encourages young women to not be influenced by the unrealistic and often degrading depictions of women in most beauty advertising. This is part of the Dove Self-Esteem Fund campaign.

However admirable this effort is, it didn’t take too long for the citizen journalists to point out that Dove’s parent company, Unilever, is one of the worst offenders through its blatant sex-driven AXE bodyspray campaigns. (See the video response here).

The lesson for us marketers and social media PR professionals is to either do your homework to make sure you don’t come off as hypocritical or don’t use social media to get your “political” message out. In almost every case - corporations’ attempts at trying to preach to their audience is laughable at best and completely disingenuous at worst. My thoughts - sell Dove on its merits as a skin cleanser - its a great product…keep it at that. And the AXE ads obviously work on young men - pretty much every guy I know uses AXE or has used it before. If you are considering going “viral” with your message you may want to avoid politically charged and self-righteous campaigns. They just may come back to bite you in the ad.

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According to the article,..

the Financial Times suggests that Microsoft may take a stake in the social network Facebook. The possible $500m investment for 5% of the business would mean that Facebook would be worth $10bn.

$10 Billion!?!? When Rupert Murdoch bought MySpace for a reported $580million earlier this year,.. it was a pretty big deal and had a lot of people questioning if (MySpace) was really worth? Will we be asking the same thing a year from now about Facebook? Is it overpriced?,.. Does it really have that much potential?

I started off with a MySpace page a year ago,.. and enjoyed it. Now I’m currently hooked on Facebook. In a year from now I might not enjoy Facebook anymore?…. What will replace it? How much will it be worth?.. These are interesting times.

Via> PSFK

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Nowadays everyone is looking to create a buzz. But how easy is replicating the success of Burger King’s Subservient Chicken or Chris “Leave Britney Alone” Crocker? Proctor & Gamble will likely find out in a new campaign to “Create a Buzz for Braun.”

In an attempt to drive awareness of its electric shavers, P&G is recruiting students from the country’s elite business schools. Contestants will submit a detailed marketing plan including strategy, tactics and evaluation. The top entries will be presented before company brass to determine a winner.

The prize? $40,000 for first place, $5,000 for second and third.

Certainly no paltry sum, but a small price to pay for the mass brainpower of the nation’s top MBAs. Still, the question remains, can you really create a buzz?

We’ll be following the contest and will post results as they’re available.

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OK…it’s been a while since I’ve posted anything here. You can tell the difference between lean times (lots of free time = lots of posts) vs. prosperous times (oh, I forgot we even have a blog). I’m very thankful that our clients are keeping us very busy. But as the President of BrainGain - a marketing, PR, web 2.0 mashup - I figured I should be eating my own dog food and joining in the global “conversation”.

So I’ve been thinking a lot about talent attraction, the main reason why I started BrainGain nearly 1 year ago. Everyone is trying to figure out how to stop the “brain drain” from cities, states, businesses, industries. For me it’s quite personal when people blame young talent…or the lack thereof for companies - especially autos - for leaving Michigan.

It’s been nearly two weeks since VW announced they were leaving Michigan because they wanted to attract more young talent. I for one find this to be complete crap. Growing up in Michigan and having a father that worked 30 years for Generous Motors - as he referred to GM - the last thing I wanted to do was work for an Auto…any Auto. I feel as many young people leave Michigan because of a lack of creative industries…not the typical reasons many have used as a scapegoat for our main industry…Crime, Lack of Public Transit, Weather, No “Cool Cities”. So here’s my first big audacious statement:

Maybe we should send the Autos out of the State if we want talent to stay!

Sounds crazy, I know. But what was once a cutting edge, creative, and innovative industry has become a talent repellent. For instance, who wouldn’t want to work for VW, either here or Virginia or New York City, when the new CEO Stefan Jacoby says about his need to attract talent:

“by reducing this organization by 30 percent, you need even more talents, more creative people, more motivated people.”

So cut staff by 30% and hire more creative people - that will have to work 30% harder and longer.

The reason Jacoby was hired was due to the resignation last November of then CEO Pischetsrieder which Adweek reported:

The decision comes amid layoffs of up to 20,000 workers, along with extended work hours at VW’s German plants and other cost-cutting measures, in an effort to compete with Asian automakers and to boost U.S. market share.

The resignation of Pischetsrieder and his replacement by Winterkorn is “a shock wave that will take awhile to travel through the industry,” said Todd Turner, principal analyst at Car Concepts in Thousand Oaks, Calif.

“It goes to show how shortsighted VW planning has become,” Turner said. “If you are projecting that kind of unhappiness with the management, why extend his contract?”

Yet young professional Detroiters like me are to blame. Maybe the reality is that Young Professionals in Virginia are stupid enough to work for a loser like VW. But growing up in Detroit, seeing the ignorance of past decisions at the Big 3, we’re not fooled. So to VW…good luck in DC…I will at least hand this much to you…you did pick one place that people are full of crap and other people are dumb enough to believe them.

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Yeah that’s right,.. it’s going down tomorrow @ the Buzz Bar. Bring all your friends and meet some new ones too. See ya there!

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Check out my “guest blogger” appearance on Metromode Media. I will be blogging about “The Dip” by Seth Godin and how Southeast Michigan can learn a few lessons from this marketing guru. Feel free to come back to this site after reading the blog and post your comments.

Enjoy!

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BrainGain Marketing is proud to announce the launch of our first site promoting the State of Michigan to Gen Y. The site milifemitimes.com is a Web 2.0 news site, offering users the ability to comment, post stories and other content, and connect with each other. The story areas we cover are travel, culture and arts, events, environment, and jobs/hot companies.

We encourage anyone to visit the site, sign-up, and start sharing great stories about Michigan. If you have any questions, visit the “contact us” page and submit your inquiries.

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A pleasant surprise came in my inbox today when I saw BrainGain featured on MetroMode Media’s weekly emag. As noted in the article BrainGain is all about marketing places and spaces to young professionals using marketing 2.0 strategies. It’s nice to get noticed for doing good and doing well.

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According to Adams Media Research sales of internet downloads of movies and TV shows will top $4 billion by 2011 up from $111 million last year. This trend obviously will continue to impact advertising models as less broadcast media will be consumed in coming years. This article on CNN.com states:

…that advertiser spending on Internet video streams to PCs and TVs will approach $1.7 billion by 2011

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