Pitches that worked

Charter Communications, the fourth largest provider of broadband, TV, and phone, wants to reach college kids as they’re returning to school, at the moment they’re arguing about which roommate gets to put their name on the bills.  Sex and beer aside, how does one market to such fickle millennials?  Music of course. New, cool, live, regional music reverberated wtih social media.

With the help of three agencies, Charter developed their Center Stage Battle of the Bands to get bands and their fans involved in a social media slugfest that culminates in a live concert in Madison, WI on October 15th. Far flung fans can watch the show live on Facebook.

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Launch a social media campaign that will build your brand and deliver results in our online Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting June 7. Speakers include Abigail Cusick (Bravo Digital), Gregory Galant (Sawhorse Media), Alex Leo (Thomson Reuters Digital), Jim Tobin (Ignite Social Media), and many more. Read the reviews.

An interesting messaging strategy here. DUMBO, the unfortunately named Brooklyn neighborhood, is the first NYC ‘hood to offer free Wi-Fi everywhere, including streets and parks. According to the DUMBO Business Improvement District (BID) and Two Trees Management, the company that owns most of the neighborhood, the Wi-Fi offer is one more example of innovation there, which also includes “green” building and an area filled with start-up businesses.

“We are encouraging people to step out of their offices and homes and engage with one another and the neighborhood in new and different ways. Wi-Fi is one more way to inspire the workforce we have and help attract new talent to the Brooklyn Waterfront. In DUMBO, you can put together a proposal while gazing at the Brooklyn Bridge and all of Manhattan,” says Alexandria Sica, executive director of the DUMBO BID in a statement.

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Business Insider has given its stamp of approval to a Blekko pitch it received and offers up tips for how to get noticed by the site’s reporters.

-Pitch a story related to a “hot topic.”
-Stay away from “lame-o PR-speak.”
-The pitch is “aggressive,” and they like “ballsy punch-throwing in a PR person.”

Who doesn’t? Sassy!

The pitch is after the jump.

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Last Thursday, FIFA awarded the 2022 World Cup soccer event to Qatar, the first time the event will be staged in the Middle East. (The 2018 games were awarded to Russia, also a first.)

To earn host country status, Qatar went up against countries like the U.S. and worked on its proposal for nearly two years. A country of about 1.5 million people, summertime temperatures can climb over 100 degrees, a concern for FIFA. And there has been controversy over the role of Qatar’s oil wealth, and whether the FIFA organization’s possible ulterior motives and personal problems came up during the deliberations.

After the jump, read the Q&A we conducted with Mike Holtzman, partner at Brown Lloyd James, fresh off a plane from Zurich. The firm served as the international PR representative for Qatar’s World Cup bid committee working in Doha, London, and New York. The firm has experience in this area – it also worked on the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics bid and the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics bid.

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ABC’s Jake Tapper investigated the history of the Presidential turkey pardon, a tradition that morphed from a gift by the Turkey lobby (National Turkey Federation) into an awkward and sometimes hilarious photo opp the day before Thanksgiving.  We wanted to know more about the bird itself and its image.

As it turns out, the head of the lobby gets choose the top tom, and a Veep if said bird cannot fulfill its duties from their own farm, as reward for service to the organization.  This year, Yubert Envia VP of turkey at Foster Farms took full advantage of the honor by not only selecting the lucky pair and ushering them to Washington, but by enjoying a four-month publicity tour complete with Secret Service agents on hand for security.

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Inspired by Iceland Video from Inspired By Iceland on Vimeo.

Iceland launched what may be the most homogeneous brand advocacy campaign in the modern era last week. All 320,000 citizens were asked to get online for one hour, at the same time, to combat misconceptions about the eruption of Eyjafjallajokull. The volcano brought air travel in Europe to a standstill in April.

Inspired by Iceland centers around a catchy music video of “Jungle Drum” by Iceland’s own Emiliana Torrini. It features the stereotypically beautiful, sporty residents (with some nudity) against a backdrop of lava fields, glaciers, geysers and the massive outdoor Blue Lagoon spa.

And it wasn’t just online. Both major phone companies gave away free oversees calls to get citizens talking about the campaign. The very active Facebook page includes links back to a number of live webcams at top tourist sites, and a growing cache of user-generated content with nearly 25,000 fans.

Hopefully the country will recoup some of the 15% decline in tourism, one of its top industries.

Kudos to iPhone app maker Smule, or Sonic Mule Inc., for tweaking the age-old and boring executive hire press release enough to get WSJ.com’s Venture Capital Dispatch to notice.

The release pokes at the juggling of egos that happens when multiple executives insist on being quoted. Since Smule makes the Glee app, which corrects your pitch as you sing along, the first quote from CEO Jeff Smith calls out the new CFO’s lack of musical ability. The second quote is the meat of the story, and the third quote shamelessly stuffs co-founder Dr. Ge Wang’s lengthy four-part title alongside “I agree with Jeff.”

Smule’s PR person Michelle Sabolich, a senior director at AtomicPR, delivered the release without explanation, and later credited the idea to the client’s “Smulean vibe.”

VC Dispatch has the release in its entirety. The staff’s Smulean vibe can be enjoyed after the jump, as one developer tests the Glee app.

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The FBI’s Ten Most Wanted List turns 60 years old today. The enduring publicity classic–and early form of crowdsourcing–has real ROI, to use the parlance of our time.

According to the Bureau’s press release, “494 fugitives have appeared on the list; 463 have been apprehended or located, with 152 of those fugitives located as a direct result of citizen cooperation.”

The story goes that wire reporter James Donovan asked J. Edgar Hoover for a list of the toughest fugitives during a card game. Hoover recognized the opportunity after the story was published and ran with it. There’s no mention of what Hoover was wearing during the meeting.

[h/t Washington Times]

[Marty Van Ness, 18-year veteran of the Turkey Talkline, now with laptop]

For the last 29 years, Butterball and Edelman have worked together to talk turkey to the American public, and this is our third time covering the evergreen pitch. This year, a Facebook Fan page and Twitter feed helps the talk-line ladies connect with nervous and budget-conscious cooks, while those with questions on more complicated topics such as the mythical Turducken and safety hazards of deep frying are encouraged to place a call.

More than 100,000 questions will be answered this season by more than 50 helpline experts. We haven’t gotten our greasy hands on the impression numbers yet, though Google News indicates the brand has been mentioned and featured some 767 times in the past month.

Related (2008): Edelman’s Butterball Turkey Talk 2.0

(2007): Butterball’s PR is Tryptophan-tastic!

Anyone in consumer PR will tell you getting a store mentioned in the paper, or shown on the evening news is as tough as hitting a C.C. Sabathia change-up.

The reps at Dan Klores Communications (DKC) juiced up the Turnpike Series angle between the Yankees and Phillies to score for their client Modell’s. DKC put together a team of man-on-the-street sources with a Quinnipiac poll in the bullpen. The result was a Newark Star-Ledger feature.

DKC brought their game to Hamilton Township, New Jersey, known as the town that divides its loyalties between the two teams equally. Though the original pitch told of equal mounds of official MLB gear at Modell’s, the channel 9 segment below reports Yankees gear outselling Phillies gear four to one. Do the fans know the outcome? Four to one = Yankees in five games.

DKC also scored hits on the local CBS, NBC and Fox affiliates in New York, with no errors.