Stunt Of The Year Or Just The Luckiest Celeb Endorsement Ever?
When it comes to PR a celebrity endorsement can be a powerful thing (providing of course the celeb is right for the product). But celebs command huge fees making an endorsement beyond the means of most small and medium sized businesses.
A company like smart phone brand Blackberry spends a fortune on marketing but last week the guys in their PR team must have been doing cartwheels around the office when the biggest celeb endorsement of the year seemingly fell into their laps without them even having to spend a penny.
Newly inaugurated US President Barack Obama - truly the man of the moment on the world stage - was revealed to be an avid Blackberry user. So avid in fact that it seems he cannot live without his phone, reportedly causing his security advisers a major headache. According to the news coverage that followed (the kind of free publicity for Blackberry that money can not buy) it seems the President’s bodyguards were worried about people reading his emails on the device. In the end (of course) he was allowed to keep it - as his staff seemingly realised it was truly indispensible!
If this story was just good fortune then truly Blackberry’s marketing staff should be thanking their lucky stars. If it was a well orchestrated piece of PR then my heartfelt congrats on pulling off the stunt of the year (I know it’s only January but this will take some beating).
If you missed the story click here to read it on the BBC’s website.
