Crisis management is an important factor when it comes to public relations and athletics. An athlete's image is major for companies to potentially endorse them. Most of an athlete's money comes from their endorsement contracts, but a tarnished image can potentially hurt their chances of getting signed.
Major sponsors like Gatorade, Nike, or Disney have an industry standard to uphold to their consumers. The face selling any of their products must be a credible one, one that the public can trust and believe in. There have been unfortunate cases where a spokesperson's personal life has conflicted with the interest of the sponsor...More than likely the sponsor will move on to find another cash cow.
When the Tiger Woods cheating scandal broke his squeaky clean reputation took a hit. Another thing was his wallet. Other than his inevitable divorce, one of the first things go was his endorsement deal with Gatorade. His PR team tried to frame the story like it was just a argument with his wife. For a few days the public was led to believe that there was nothing going on and that the story was blown out of proportion. I know I was part of that group. When the real story came out, I didn't want to believe it. Like the old saying goes when it comes to framing: If the facts don't fit the frame, you don't change the story. You change the facts.
In the end Tiger Woods' PR team tried to take the actual story and frame it could still keep him in good standing with his sponsors and the public. But unfortunately the truth was revealed and he really did have multiple mistresses.
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Thursday, October 28, 2010
Blog #3
This new social media craze is amazing! For a class assignment I had to find out how to use Flickr. I've heard of the site before but never really knew much about it. I just thought it was another way to have an online photo album that you can share with friends(sound familiar???...Facebook).
Now, I'm a regular guy who doesn't like things to be too complicated or fancy. I don't have a smart phone and the only reason I have a Twitter account was because it was mandatory for a class. To me, Facebook is combination of Twitter and Flickr. So why would I want to open an account just for pictures? That question was answered when I took the tutorial on the Flickr homepage.
The similarities to Zuckerberg's cash cow are unavoidable because there is only so much you can do with uploading, tagging, and commenting on pictures. But, two features that made all the difference with me are the note adding and pin point location features.
What if you have a picture with three friends laughing and one friend in the background with a straight face? On any other site you can add captions below the picture to try and explain the situation. With the note adding feature you can put a word box on the actual photo as if each person was speaking. I think that can help tell the story of what really went on in the picture, almost like a live comic strip.
The pin point location feature can come in handy for PR firms when they take pictures at their events. When uploading pictures to your Flickr page you can tag friends as well as the place where the picture was taken. On the side there is an option to click a map and type in a city or address and drag the picture over that specific spot so you can actually show people where you were when you took it. Back to the PR firm and their successful event, if I wanted to know where the grand opening of the new restaurant was I could just see the map of its location behind the picture.
Like I said, I'm not a complicated guy but at the end of my virtual tour of the site I was impressed enough to go ahead and create an account for me. My Flickr
Now, I'm a regular guy who doesn't like things to be too complicated or fancy. I don't have a smart phone and the only reason I have a Twitter account was because it was mandatory for a class. To me, Facebook is combination of Twitter and Flickr. So why would I want to open an account just for pictures? That question was answered when I took the tutorial on the Flickr homepage.
The similarities to Zuckerberg's cash cow are unavoidable because there is only so much you can do with uploading, tagging, and commenting on pictures. But, two features that made all the difference with me are the note adding and pin point location features.
What if you have a picture with three friends laughing and one friend in the background with a straight face? On any other site you can add captions below the picture to try and explain the situation. With the note adding feature you can put a word box on the actual photo as if each person was speaking. I think that can help tell the story of what really went on in the picture, almost like a live comic strip.
The pin point location feature can come in handy for PR firms when they take pictures at their events. When uploading pictures to your Flickr page you can tag friends as well as the place where the picture was taken. On the side there is an option to click a map and type in a city or address and drag the picture over that specific spot so you can actually show people where you were when you took it. Back to the PR firm and their successful event, if I wanted to know where the grand opening of the new restaurant was I could just see the map of its location behind the picture.
Like I said, I'm not a complicated guy but at the end of my virtual tour of the site I was impressed enough to go ahead and create an account for me. My Flickr
Thursday, October 7, 2010
Blog #2
James Hoggan’s "Do the Right Thing" is a big refresher from what I learned in Intro to PR during the spring semester. The first three chapters focused on how to achieve public relations success, the dark side of PR and the social media revolution.
The main focus I pulled from chapter one was the Hoggan approach (p. 4). He gave us three simple rules to achieving public relations success:
1. Do the right thing
2. Be seen doing the right thing
3. And don’t get #1 and #2 mixed up
To me, that is as simple as it gets. It does not seem hard to take an honest proactive approach and when doing it, making sure that it is not forced. It seemed like Hoggan was saying the public can tell when people feel as though they are obligated to doing right instead of having it come second nature. When positive acts are genuine, the public can be a lot more receptive and even sympathetic at times.
In the second chapter, Darth Vader PR, Hoggan was pointing out ways that PR practitioners were being deceptive in their tactics. Just like a young Anakin Skywalker, most PR practitioners start out with good and humble intentions. But when they stray away from the teachings of Yoda and using the Force and start to drift over to the Sith and the dark side that’s when you get the Darth Vader characters like Philip Morris International Inc. (pp. 20-21).
They hired independent scientists to try and persuade people that cigarettes were safe. Through a PR firm, APCO-Worldwide, they formed a grassroots organization called The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition, or TASSC. The company figured that if the public could buy in to believing the scientists came from a legit backing then their information must be true. Fortunately the plan was figured out, but that started a new trendy tactic of having a front organization to achieve legitimacy.
Chapter three’s the Social Media Revolution deals with social media being, “an engine for the anti-powerful - an authentic, interactive means of delivering content,” said Jesse Hirsh, a Canadian social media watcher (p. 36).
That means that anyone can get their message out to the public with the addition of receiving feedback. The anti-powerful is the public because in the past they did not have a choice as to how companies went about giving out information, but due to the growing use of social media, advertisements have to be more strategic in how they reach their targeted publics.
The main focus I pulled from chapter one was the Hoggan approach (p. 4). He gave us three simple rules to achieving public relations success:
1. Do the right thing
2. Be seen doing the right thing
3. And don’t get #1 and #2 mixed up
To me, that is as simple as it gets. It does not seem hard to take an honest proactive approach and when doing it, making sure that it is not forced. It seemed like Hoggan was saying the public can tell when people feel as though they are obligated to doing right instead of having it come second nature. When positive acts are genuine, the public can be a lot more receptive and even sympathetic at times.
In the second chapter, Darth Vader PR, Hoggan was pointing out ways that PR practitioners were being deceptive in their tactics. Just like a young Anakin Skywalker, most PR practitioners start out with good and humble intentions. But when they stray away from the teachings of Yoda and using the Force and start to drift over to the Sith and the dark side that’s when you get the Darth Vader characters like Philip Morris International Inc. (pp. 20-21).
They hired independent scientists to try and persuade people that cigarettes were safe. Through a PR firm, APCO-Worldwide, they formed a grassroots organization called The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition, or TASSC. The company figured that if the public could buy in to believing the scientists came from a legit backing then their information must be true. Fortunately the plan was figured out, but that started a new trendy tactic of having a front organization to achieve legitimacy.
Chapter three’s the Social Media Revolution deals with social media being, “an engine for the anti-powerful - an authentic, interactive means of delivering content,” said Jesse Hirsh, a Canadian social media watcher (p. 36).
That means that anyone can get their message out to the public with the addition of receiving feedback. The anti-powerful is the public because in the past they did not have a choice as to how companies went about giving out information, but due to the growing use of social media, advertisements have to be more strategic in how they reach their targeted publics.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)