When is PR a responsibility for “non-marketing” people to get involved in? Right now! Public relations is no longer the job of a department. Everyone in an organization is responsible and an ambassador for getting the word out. And visibility – or making our company known – is the name of the game.
In the days following Tiger Woods’ car accident and his “indefinite leave” from golf, the media focused on Tiger’s damaged reputation and lost income. Meanwhile, two UC Davis economists focused on a larger, more widely felt and more immediate event: shareholder value…
Christopher Knittel and Victor Stango took advantage of their love of sports and their professional talents. The result was a study http://faculty.gsm.ucdavis.edu/~vstango/tiger003.pdf that concluded that between November 27th and December 11th, shareholders of companies that endorsed Tiger lost between $5 and $12 billion wealth. They put their findings in a news release and sent it out “over the wire.” The result was “that the story exploded.”
The story reached more than 13 million “print” readers in the United States. That didn’t include online readers or international papers like the Tehran Times (Iran’s English newspaper), the Toronto Globe & Mail, and the Sydney (Australia) Morning Herald.
It appeared on 168 TV and radio broadcasts, reaching 10 million viewers, the equivalent of $100,000 of advertising. The tracking service reported that the coverage on Good Morning America alone, which charges $35,000 for a 30-second TV ad, reached more than 4 million viewers.
It was cited in more than 1,000 blogs, including the Huffington Post and National Public Radio’s Public Money.
Placemaking Group’s Sacramento PR maven, Jan Burch, talked to Christopher Knittel. Most days Knittel and Stango focus on banking markets and how that affects the consumer and household decision-making — “Many people underestimate how quickly their wealth will grow if they save and how costly borrowing is relative to saving” – or environmental and transportation markets and how gas prices, car prices and environmental regulations affect the cars people buy.
“Tiger Woods was just fun for us,” Knittel said. When asked what was next for them, he said they would like to continue to study the value of celebrities to companies when those opportunities appear.
The point: we all have talent, expertise and passion. Remember what you’re passionate about, follow it and make sure you get the word out. You just might hit one out of the park.
This is minimum, about a disfunctional childhood coming back to haunt a very great golfer (athlete) who thought his status gave him special privilege. We mimick our parents as we grow older and Tiger watched his dad cheat on his mom for years. Tiger is no different than lots and lots of other disfunctional people (families), he just happens to be famous. As far as his addictions go, Vicodin is a narcotic and they are highly habit forming as medical science has proven. Just because it not pure hydrocodone, doesn’t mean it’s a wimpy drug. It’s plenty powerful psychologically
SMC
What has happened to Tiger Woods is unfortunate but eminent. I agree with insurance adjuster and take that to the next level by comparing the new Nike advertisement with Tiger Woods’s father speaking to him with clips of his voice “talking” to Tiger. The advertisement really takes the scandal to the next level. In a good or bad way, its hard to say, however it really leaves it up to the viewer to judge. The fact that 2 Davis economists analyzed this situation is incredible and really hones in on how celebrity endorsements pay off – or can completely ruin a company’s reputation. The fact that Tiger Woods received negative publicity exploded the media facet, showing that any PR is good PR. If you’re in the news, you’re making money – bottom line.