When Bad Press Is Good

OMG, Gossip Girl has a new ad campaign! This one takes their worst reviews and places them over pictures of the steamier scenes. No such thing as bad press, I guess.

The intent is obvious: make teens think that watching GG is rebellious and cool. It's a smart move, and the show has actually taken off despite bad acting and boring plotlines involving parents hooking up. Kind of frustrating in contrast with the books, which are actually really clever and have great characters. Just goes to show that if you put beautiful people in beautiful clothes on screen then the writing isn't the most relevant aspect of the show.

No 'Fail Whale' for Twitter

I have been a member of Twitter for at least a year now...but it wasn't until recently that I became a Twitter-phile. I use twitter daily and post and receive updates from the people I follow. Part of my obsession has come from the application Twinkle, which lets me see what people are saying in my area, regardless of whether or not I am Following them on Twitter.

This article summarizes and captures what makes Twitter unique and why it is successful.

Oh, by the way, you can follow me on twitter here: @AxiomPR

Girly Bloggers

Infamous dating blogger Julia Allison has teamed up with two other girls to make a really girly blog. Called "NonSociety", they are so far covering fashion, dating, and tech news. More contributors promised to come soon.

The left-to-right layout feels a little weird to me, and the style section reads like a Body Shop ad. Maybe it is? A little endorsement cash behind this blog wouldn't be too shocking.

Advertising vs. PR

With the daily increase in ads that I see and the news of NBC locking up over $1 billion in ad revenue for the Olympics, it got me thinking -- is advertising worth it?

Many ad campaigns have generated a considerable amount of public appeal, but they fail to do the one thing they are supposed to: increase sales.

Some notable campaigns:

- Got Milk campaign. Hugely popular and famous campaign. Did milk sales increase? Nope. They continued to fall year after year since the campaign.

- Yo quiero Taco Bell. Remember that campaign with the dog? Massively popular and parodied, but it didn't increase sales. The agency behind the ad campaign was also fired.

- Whassup? Arguably one of the most popular ad campaigns in the last 20 years, but sales of Budweiser have been declining steadily. They went from 50 million barrels in 1990 to less than 35 million in 2000. Bud Light has been doing well without the Whaasup campaign.

I'm not saying that advertising is never effective, but I believe it is widely overspent and often irresponsibly. Advertising should be used to defend a brand and keep it relevant.

PR should be used to build the brand. Often times companies try to build a brand/product through advertising alone.

More thoughts on this to come. For a more in-depth look at advertising and PR, check out this great book.