Top 10 PR and marketing stunts and campaigns of May 2013

Thanks to sponsorship from PR and journalist service DWPub (who still sponsor the newsletter and advertise on-site now – glance to the right and click/pay them all your money), we have a bit of cash in the bank.

As mentioned in this blog at the beginning of the April, in line with my aim to ensure PRexamples.com is about quality and not quantity, I’ve put up a £50 prize for the author of the most popular post each month. This way, even if one of our 150-ish signed up contributors only posted once in any given month, there’s a fair chance their post could win the cash.

Here, with links to the posts and Twitter links to the contributors that make PRexamples what it is (go, follow them and say hi, they’re all brilliant) are the top 10 PR and marketing stunts and campaigns of the month, compiled very simply by looking at the best-read posts on the site by unique visitor. A great list, including three campaigns from around the world by Coca-Cola, a brand that appears to have upped its marketing efforts in the last month or so.

Congratulations to WPR’s Jade Mansell, who, after the stunt roundup I posted, had the most popular post throughout May with her Snickers write-up and wins the £50 this month!

1. Stunt roundup: How the world of PR reacted to Sir Alex Ferguson’s retirement – with the Queen’s Parliamentary speech in the UK and Manchester United’s Sir Alex Ferguson announcing his retirement, the British PR world could do little but piggyback for a week or so – and egads, did we. This post features some brilliant efforts.

2. Snickers teams up with Google in brilliant misspelled search terms stunt – so, Snickers is still going stro– well, it’s still going, with it’s ‘you’re not you when you’re hungry’ marketing campaign/brand message. You know, the one that got them in hot water when celebrities were clearly paid to tweet but didn’t declare it, Anyway, this campaign is actually pretty clever, tying SEO and PR into one neat package. Post by WPR Agency’s Jade Mansell

3.  7Up create the worlds first ‘melting vending machine’ – I’ve been trying for years to get an ice sculpture stunt signed off, but this 7Up video campaign in Argentina (needless interjection – remember Cool Spot?) took it to the next level, giving members of the public free cans as the ice block ‘vending machine’ melted. Post by Twelve Thirty Eight’s Inderdeep Gill

4. Ladbrokes release brilliant spoof photos of royal birth – post author Jade and her agency might have something in their theory that anything mentioning Kate Middleton or 50 Shades of Grey will get coverage. This lookalike effort launching bookies Ladbrokes’ Royal Baby Odds went down very well this week. Post by WPR’s Jade Mansell

5. Brazilian beer cans turned into metro tickets to prevent drunk driving – a very clever campaign by beer brand Antarctica, resulting in a 43% reduction in drink drivers caught after Rio de Janeiro’s famous Carnival. Definitely award-worthy. Post by WAA’s Alex Mansell

6.  ‘First ever blood swimming pool’ announced in latest gory Resident Evil UK PR stunt – how do you follow a stunt involving a butchery with edible limbs? With a bloody-filled swimming pools filled with human limbs, of course! We were very kindly invited, but, after Woolwich murder, Capcom very wisely decided to pull the stunt, which showed great tact and judgement – not often seen within marketing.

7. Share a Coke campaign launches with personalised bottles – we’ve all seen them, here, William Murray Communications’ Donna White looks at Coke’s named bottle campaign.

8. Billboard turned into giant trap in insect spray stunt – a very nice time lapse video stunt in which a billboard empty but for a giant image of an insect spray can was pasted with invisible glue, becoming the final resting place of hundreds of thousands of Milan’s flies and mosquitoes.

9. Coke’s Happy Flag – tapping into a national identity – a charming campaign from Denmark in which Coca Cola simply provided people with free flags to welcome loved ones arriving at Copenhagen Airport, after somebody noticed the Danish flag featured within Coca-Cola’s 100+ year old logo. Post by Octopus Comms’ Chris Owen

10.  Coca-Cola’s ‘Small World’ stunt invites Pakistanis and Indians to heal their strained relationship – Coca-Cola encouraged Indians and Pakistanis to make friends with one another, via interactive machines placed in busy shopping centres in each country. It’s a very nice effort, tackling a pretty sensitive issue. Well worth a watch.

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