How to create a PR stunt.
Meet Graham - A highly effective PR activation by the Transport Accident Commission in Melbourne
Executed well, PR stunts are a highly cost-effective way of catapulting an unknown brand into the public’s consciousness.
Brands like Brewdog built their profile, early on, through creative stunts - and while they are now investing very significant sums on brand and advertising (£17m in 2021) - it’s the stunts that helped them punch above their weight - even if some have come back to bite them.
What’s less talked about is the millions upon millions that companies invest in PR stunts for no return whatsoever, because the reality is that PR stunts are high-risk activities that often fail to hit the mark.
How can you come up with a PR campaign that works?
When we talk to clients and prospects about PR, we often put activity into one of three buckets; news, views and vehicles.
News is when a company has done something that either has or will have, a measurable impact on a specific group of people.
Views are when a spokesperson takes a position on an issue, topic or third-party news development (like a political, or economic event).
Vehicles are when a company ‘does a thing’ that takes them beyond news and views. It’s often the activation of a ‘big idea’ that gets the right people talking about a brand.
For me, consumer PR cannot be done impactfully and effectively without a vehicle (aside from coverage in review pages).
Finding the right ‘vehicle’ takes time. What is the big idea or insight? Who do we want to be talking about us? What do we want from them? How will the business execute the idea and who will do it? How will we measure its effectiveness and cost it up properly?
To start, I’ll often suggest some ‘seed funding’ to create the idea, set a budget and cost it up, before identifying a third party to help execute it.
I think there are seven main types of ‘vehicle’ available and below I’ve described them as I see them and listed a few examples I often like to cite. What could your vehicle be?
1 / BUILD SOMETHING (EG, MEET GRAHAM)
Building a physical manifestation of the problem you’re solving makes it more tangible.
This example (Meet Graham) is a great example - a human being, but with the physical features required to survive a car accident. It was developed by Transport Accident Commission in Melbourne as part of a "towards zero" campaign to reduce speeding and road fatalities.
This grotesque waxwork, developed by scientists, was placed in a museum and got more people talking than a standard comms campaign winning multiple PR awards after the story went around the globe.
2 / MEASURE SOMETHING (EG, GOOD COUNTRY)
Own the data, own the narrative.
Media love lists - as human beings we are driven by status and where we (and our communities) sit in the pecking order.
Good Country was created to draw attention to how nation-states’ relative importance in the world is usually driven by GDP (production) but perhaps nation-states should be judged by their wider contribution to the world.
Such data sets can form the backbone of a b2b marketing campaign; housed in a White Paper, launched at an event including existing clients and prospects.
In the case of Good Country, the index earned the consultant who created it a TED Talk.
3 / LEAD BY EXAMPLE (EG, BRANDO)
One way to rise above your peers is to do things that they can’t or won’t, that point to better outcomes.
In this case (an example I worked on) outdoor advertiser JCDecaux was trying to make the case for greater investment in brand building vs sales activation, with marketers arguably overspending on the latter.
They published a manifesto and built an event around the idea.
Self-interested yes, but also a beneficial argument for other brand channels meaning others could get behind it.
4 / LOBBY FOR CHANGE (EG. TIGA)
Lobbying or ‘public affairs’ is a strand of communications activity targeted at influencing politicians to introduce new policies or change laws.
Lobbying can attract media interest, as proposed changes to the law carry a wider potential impact than anything a single person or entity can do. Messages also carry an active call to action, which means people can place themselves in the story, and typically advocate a change in behaviour by people in power - a David vs Goliath tension narrative (and all stories carry tension).
In this case, the founder of independent UK games publisher Rebellion set up a body to specifically lobby for tax breaks incentivising inward investment into UK games.
They achieved their objective, inward investment increased creating a hub for games development in the UK, which had a positive flywheel effect on the sector.
Today games are the UK’s largest creative industry by revenue by a mile; larger than the music, TV production and film industries combined.
5 / COMMUNITY CREATION (EG. SUPERNOVA)
Creating and hosting branded communities that offer value to a specific cohort of people is a great way to elevate a brand; bringing everyone in an ecosystem together around a focal point that speaks to the wider problem the brand is trying to solve.
It’s an old trick in tech, Salesforce’s annual conference set the standard for how to become a category king and most SaaS businesses have a community in their sights.
Platforms like Disciple Media & Mighty Networks exist to host such communities.
Adtech firm Quantcast created its own brand ‘Supernova’ to anchor their big data credentials, which led to a microsite and event series.
6 / CAUSE APPLICATION (EG. LIVE AID)
Applying what you do for the benefit of a social cause not only communicates a brand’s virtuous side but can give you an unrivalled fame platform.
The charity concert is now a standard but LiveAid was, if not the first, the pioneer at the peak of the 1980s Ethiopian famine.
Sir Bob Geldof is arguably more famous (and celebrated) for his role in making this happen than for any of his music.
Not everything has to be done on this kind of scale, but a pro-bono campaign can produce a great case study for what you do.
7 / PRODUCT DEVIATION (EG. BLEWBURY APP)
Finally, and this is a bit more abstract, is the twist on the familiar - using an existing product in a surprising, unusual and new way.
This won’t work for all products, but it’s something that I tried myself when working with the white-label social media app company Disciple Media.
The company, at the time, was well-known for making community apps for musicians but wanted to enter new markets; including politicians, churches, the creator economy and more.
I used the app to make a social network for my own village; a fun David and Goliath “taking on Facebook story” that earned coverage in the local press.
Consider what activation might work for you.
As an exercise, I would consider which of these seven types of activations could work for your business by asking seven questions;
Thinking about the problem we solve, or the value we bring to customers, could we create something physical to bring it to life?
Do we have a specific measure for the specific problem we solve? And by how much we can solve it? Or a measure of what might happen if we don’t succeed? Where might that data live?
Thinking about our category what makes us truly different, or how could we stand out in a way our competitors can’t do or won’t do? How can we create tension out of this vulnerability, draw battle lines, and lay down the gauntlet? What does our “Pepsi Challenge” look like?
Are there any laws or political policies that stand in the way of progress? Or, would a change in law open up an opportunity? Who is the minister/ public figure accountable for that policy area - what do they think about the issue? Who else might advocate a change in the law?
Is there a community around our category or advocates of our idea? What communities and forums matter to our customers? Beyond sponsorship of events, what other value could we bring to this community?
Can our product or service be used to improve the lives of a vulnerable population (or individual), specifically one that we are connected to in some way? How can we improve things for them? How can we measure/ showcase the outcomes?
Can our product or service be repurposed in an unlikely or unusual way, but that still showcases its unique attributes vs the competition?
I’ll close by saying that, while activations are (probably) the only way to make a business really famous or talked about - they are high risk in that they are often expensive and time-consuming to pull off, yet carry no guarantee of success.
A business that has not done PR before, has no profile and is trying to attract ‘enough’ customers would be better to start with the ‘basics’ of opinion-led PR, executive profiling, and leveraging the news moments it has.
PR tends to be more effective when embellishing an already effective marketing and sales function (rather than replacing it), especially in the field of b2b/ corporate communications.
Start there, then build a business case for an activation.