Festive 'Spot the Difference' with the X Factor

Here at celebrity towers everyone seems to need a little Christmas – me, I’m a little more ‘Bah, Humbug’, at least until my third glass of champers.  Anyway, I thought I’d attempt to join in the fun with a suitably festive game of ‘spot the difference’.  So pop-pickers, can you spot the, rather expensive, difference between these two videos?

Here’s the spoiler sweeties….

It takes a while but if you pause at 48 seconds in you’ll see the frames below



Now you see him...



 




...now he's gone
...to Hollywood maybe?



As you can see M&S (okay, their ad agency, don’t get picky) has edited Frankie Cocozza out of the group scene from their X Factor themed Christmas ad.  This is different from the various versions where they’ve changed the soloists in the line up as people leave the show.  It’s specialist editing which needs to be done one frame at a time and, I’m guessing, can’t have been cheap – I would imagine it certainly won’t have been budgeted for.

But you might ask whilst this is all lovely, fluffy, Christmas frivolity and an excuse for me to put Crimbo cheer upon my blog what does it have to do with charities and celebrities?  Well pop on the reindeer slippers and ears, pull up a comfy chair, grab a mince pie and something medicinal, and I’ll tell you (you may want to turn down The Sound of Music).

Many charities work with celebrities and that endorsement can have terrific benefits for the charity…… but…… here comes the science bit (well they said Management was a science at my university)… when you work with a celebrity you are aligning two brands, yours and theirs.  Damage to one brand can affect the other.  Whilst 99.9% of the time it will be fine just occasionally something happens in the celeb’s life which means you want to distance yourself from them – after all you don’t want an interview being dominated about their personal life instead of their support for your cause or your key messages.

You might say that Frankie’s alleged misbehaviour falls into the category of predictable but I know of cases when it hasn’t been. What if you’d secured Frankie to headline an event? Put him on posters? Even worse signed him up to a front your new ‘just say no’ to drugs campaign?  If you’re M&S you quietly make him disappear (and of course have the funds to do it).  If you’re a charity you can cancel press interviews, that’s cheap, but can you so easily afford to cancel an event, reprint posters or even recall all your fantastic ‘just say no’ leaflets?

There are no easy answers but it’s something any charity that works with a celebrity should always bear in mind.  So my yuletide message is to not assume that once you have a celeb that everything’s solved and the world will be a happier place. Just occasionally what looked like a fantastic opportunity can turn into reputation management nightmare.

….and on that cheery note I’m off to look for last minute deals on a bauble-free winter break.  It’s been tinsel a-go-go wherever I look since the August bank holiday and, quite frankly, I’m beginning to get a little fed up of it.  Personally, I blame Charles Dickens!

The stunt that got lucky with timing

A conversation this morning reminded me that real news has a nasty habit of getting in the way of your story or event as I mentioned back in June over the Conran donation to the Design Museum.

Last week Remember a Charity got a lot of pick up for this stunt with Rocky Taylor throwing himself from a burning ‘building’.  Here’s the video:

Creativity is increasingly important and this got coverage because it was a lot more than a simple stunt. 

1) Rocky is a world class stuntman

2) He’s 64 – which is probably 500 in stunt years

3) The stunt he was doing nearly killed him last time he tried it in 1985, so a real sense of jeopardy

4) The stunt actually tied back to the core message – ‘when you make a will think about charities as well’.  I’d imagine anyone about to do a ‘death defying’ stunt would make sure they’d organised their will.

This was a straight media opportunity which went well – Rocky survived.  I have no doubt it cost a fortune.  They had numerous cameras and the insurance on a man repeating something that nearly killed him 26 years ago can’t have been cheap.  However also think about how lucky they were with the timing. 

Just a week later these were the images that were dominating the news:

Let’s be honest would you want to be staging that stunt this week?  Even if you did, do you think any news outlet would want to run it?  If anything the charity would have almost certainly come in for criticism for trivialising something we had just seen for real on the front page of many of the UK’s papers – there’s a copy of that image on the Daily Mail website.

So when you’re risk assessing a media activity remember to allow for the possibility of real news either meaning you get no coverage or even worse that you have to call the whole thing off, possibly at great expense.

One question in a survey doth not a story make.....

So Yougov have asked one question in a survey and writes authoritatively as if they have the world of celebrities and charities nailed?  Well that’s good.  We might as well all go home now – a large white wine for me please.

Oh, you want analysis?  You want detail?  You want a fuller understanding of the subject?  Why should I bother with that?  Yougov didn’t. 

To be fair Yougov didn’t say they knew everything, but I don’t think one question is enough to justify a story (I can’t blame them for trying though).  It’s certainly not enough to justify anyone making a strategic decision.

In ‘cynical celebrity charity’ they say 46% of all Brits think that celebrities supporting charities are guilty of cynical self promotion.  However 36% of those surveyed said that they thought celebrities were genuinely trying to do good. If we look at just women the figure rises to 41%, which is also the figure for 18-24 year olds.

So what have we actually learnt?  That some people are not influenced by celebrities? Didn’t they already know that?  That men are more cynical than women when it comes to celebrity?  Gosh, couldn’t they have just wandered down to their local newsagents and seen what sells?  Magazine publishing is a multi-million pound business and that huge commercial behemoth produces lots of celeb magazines targeted at women, particularly younger women. I guarantee they spend a fortune to find out what their readers like and don’t like.

Well at least we’ve saved a trip to the nearest branch of W H Smiths. 

So what exactly is the point of the story?  Use celebs?  Don’t use celebs?  Use them carefully?  They don’t say although they try and expand with a quote from War on Want in which they say it's ‘imperative that the power of that [celebrity] voice is directed in the right direction’.  That’ll be the charity I wrote about last Christmas which ‘cynically’ tried to draw Dannii Minogue into a story about high street retailers using sweatshops with a press release entitled Dannii in M&S ‘sweatshop’ storm.  By the way Dannii wasn’t involved; they were just trying to hook their story to the X-Factor Final.

Ask anyone who works in this area of the sector and they could easily have told you that celebrities aren’t right for every audience but that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be used.  Celebrity is a part of the marketing mix; a tool to be used properly and carefully, like any other.  For example would many of those magazines cover a particular charity’s work if they didn’t get a lovely celebrity to go with it?

Oh and do they question whether poll answers are representative of actions in the real world? Of course not – they’re a polling organisation.  I’ve seen senior (male) board directors get excited at a charity event because they got to meet a celebrity who showed interest in their work and support for the charity.  I’m fairly certain they would have been in the cynical camp if polled.

All in all a non story with a bit of stating the obvious thrown in for good measure!  Know your audience and target accordingly.  Isn’t that what everyone aspires to?

The PR agency, the charity & the lack of understanding

It’s a common old story.  A small charity wants to try and recruit some celebrity support to help raise the profile of their work. Not an unreasonable thought, but as ever the question is how you go about it.

Finding celebrities who might have an affinity with your cause is a time consuming business which can involve hours of painstaking research – I genuinely know someone who was on page 86 of a Google search when they found a mention of a celebrity who had a direct link with the work of their charity (the celebrity did go on to support them!).

Of course a bit of luck never hurts.  Nothing like spotting a reference to something useful in the last but one paragraph of an interview with a celebrity who’d be perfect.

I’m not discounting luck but random mass appeals for celebrity support rarely if ever work and hardly make a celebrity feel like it’s them in particular with whom you’d like to work. 

I’ve queried before the use of tweeting as a method of approaching celebrities.  Today I’ve seen another version of this kind of apparently untargeted appeal which does nothing to enhance the reputation of the charity involved.  Those in the PR and communications world will probably have heard of Response Source – a way for journalists and PR’s to get in touch with each other.

An email from Response Source today read as follows (I’ve removed references that I think might identify the charity):

Hi,

I work for [name of small UK charity] and we're in the process of appointing some more high profile ambassadors to help promote our messages of [key message].

We're particularly interested in GB Olympians past and present as well as other sports stars from the world of football, rugby and tennis to promote the importance of [area of work].

We're also after celebrities that would appeal to housewives and families such as daytime TV personalities and big name soap stars.

We would hope that any ambassador would be able to give up a couple of hours for one appearance a year and the possible endorsement of some quotes once in a while - we appreciate that their time will be limited.

Had it been an enthusiastic, overworked, PR from an understaffed communications team in a small organisation I might have had some sympathy.  However it isn’t.  It’s from a PR agency appointed by the charity to run a national awareness campaign.

I doubt they’ll get any response since the one group of people I know won’t be reading it is agents and managers.  This is not the sort of service that most agents subscribe to.  The only people who might be relevant are companies who have a contract with a celebrity to promote that company’s product or service.

If the charity wants to gain one or more high profile supporters they, or their PR agency, should develop ‘thought through’, relevant approaches to individuals who have an affinity to the cause and with whom they would hope to have a long term relationship.

This email shows very little understanding of how to work with celebrities when you’re a charity.  If I was the charity I wouldn’t be very happy with my agency.  More particularly I’d be unhappy paying for expertise which doesn’t appear to be there – although for all I know the agency is very generously doing this pro-bono. 

If you want a long term relationship, how do you make someone feel wanted and special when you haven’t sent them a personal approach?  What happens if someone comes back who doesn’t fit with your brand or (as a health charity) healthy living messages and you have to turn them down? 

They’ve clearly identified their target media and the sorts of people who might appeal, now they need to do the research.  I’ve done radio days with celebs and when we had to change the interviewee at the last minute what was the first question I was asked by the radio stations? What’s your new celeb’s link to the cause?

Whilst they are quite clear in the ‘ask’ I’d question whether they’ve got it right. They want a “couple of hours for one appearance a year” but what does that mean?  They talk about target media so maybe they mean be available for two hours of interviews – except that is frequently not two hours.  If they live in Dundee and the interviews need to be done face to face in London that’s at least a day.  If they were lucky enough to get their celeb on ITV1’s This Morning (given the demographic they’ve identified) that alone would use up the commitment they’ve asked for.

If they really do mean a personal appearance do they honestly think two hours is sufficient?  Again they don’t seem to have allowed for any travel time although I assume they’ve allowed for any travel costs and possible food or accommodation.

Whilst the concept of working with a celebrity is perfectly reasonable this is not the way to be going about it.  There are no short cuts to gaining celebrity support and an email like this does nothing to enhance the reputation of the charity or its PR company.

The thing I find most perplexing, above everything else, is that the agency itself claims strong sport related clients.  Surely they have access to just the sort of people they need? 

Oh well, maybe this email is just a blip – after all who hasn’t had an off day?

When the real world gets in the way of your great story

Gaining the support of a high profile individual is hard work for any organisation.  Carefully stewarding that support over the years to ensure you retain it is even harder.  The hardest of all is when you turn that supporter into someone who also donates significant amounts of money.

Clearly this is something that The Design Museum has achieved in its relationship with Sir Terence Conran and the Conran Foundation.  It was announced yesterday that the Foundation is to donate £7.5m in cash plus the value of the sale of the lease of the museum’s current site, expected to be in the region of £10m.  The money will be used to help fund a move to a new site at the Commonwealth Institute.

This is a fantastic commitment from Sir Terence, although to be fair, he was involved in establishing the forerunner of the museum and establishing the museum on its current site.

So why am I blogging about it?  Because I think the timing of the announcement is at best a little insensitive.  Sir Terence is probably the foremost proponent of design and style in the home.  It was Habitat that started turning houses across the country into light, bright, stylish palaces of design.  That’s why I think the timing is insensitive. 

Just a week ago it was announced that Habitat was to go into administration as part of a sale of the name, online presence and three flagship stores to the Home Retail Group.  The sale price is £24.5m, just £7m more than the value of Sir Terence’s donation to the Design Museum.  For the 750 staff who work outside of the core business there is a very uncertain future.

Now it should be made clear that Sir Terence stopped being Chair of the Storehouse Group in 1990, some 21 years ago.  Should he have stepped in to rescue his baby which is now fully grown up and has a life of its own?  Well that’s for him to decide not me, it’s really none of my business.

I just feel the timing of this announcement is a little bit off.  As the High Street brand, that established him as a leading name in design, appears to fall apart, would I have made that announcement now?  I think not.  In the circumstances I would have left a suitable, reverent pause.  Sir Terence turns 80 in October.  Even if he’d written the cheques now (and I have no doubt this was planned well before the news of Habitat) I think I would have played it safe and used his birthday celebrations, and a four month break, to make the announcement.

I think there’s a lesson here for all of us in being sensitive to the world around us.  No matter how long it’s taken you to put together a project or media event, when you’re working with high profile individuals always be aware that the real world and news agendas can just occasionally get in the way and rather spoil the party.

Celeb support is only as good as the PRs promoting them

When I started this blog I thought I’d be writing for myself (or maybe me and a couple of friends who work in the sector and are willing to humour me) so I’m amazed that in fact it’s been read by around a thousand people.  Who knew I’d even end up contributing the odd blog for the Guardian’s Voluntary Sector Network?

Apparently with profile comes getting targeted by PR people – which I take as a huge, if unexpected compliment.  On twitter I’ve been asked to promote charity events and singles.  On the blog I’ve been asked for advice and today has seen my first full blown press release!

Only problem is that the PR was close but won’t be winning any cigars from me.  On the left of this blog I explain what I write about; specifically “the use of celebrity in the UK's charity sector”.  Today’s release was about a Hollywood A-lister backing a campaign.  Credit where credit is due it is about charity and it is about celebrity. Apparently they’re asking “Americans to pledge and make a difference”.  How does that relate to the UK?

Ironically said Hollywood A-Lister was in London promoting the UK version of the cause a month ago.  Had I been targeted then I might have blogged something.

The opening paragraph of the email says “Wanted to see if you could show your support and post [Big Hollywood Name]’s PSA for their new campaign”. Have you read my blog? No seriously? Have you? It’s not about promoting particular causes.  It’s about commenting on when charities working with celebrities get it right and when I think they get it wrong. I don’t support any particular cause via this blog – oh and NEVER assume I know what an acronym stands for.  I’m guessing PSA means Public Service Announcement since I don’t think they wanted me to talk about the star’s Prostate Specific Antigen test results.

Celebrities are only as good as the media team that’s promoting their support for the cause.  For me a bêtte noir is the media person who randomly targets you without knowing about your publication or output.  I’m just a little blogger – imagine the amount of stuff that real journalists and TV producers get sent.

I’m always impressed by the media team that spends time scouring newspapers and magazines and can quote chapter and verse on where and when particular publications will use celebrity interviews.  But I’ve seen the same people pitch to a TV or radio show having never watched or listened to it.  Pitching to This Morning is no different to pitching to Celebs on Sunday (The Sunday Mirror Magazine).

In fact I have heard of one Media Manager who was asked to listen to a particular radio show as they had a big awareness event coming up for the condition they represented and it was something that would be common to listeners of that programme.  She didn’t understand why she should listen to the show rather than just shooting off a press release.

Having been on the production side of TV and radio shows I know how irritating untargeted approaches can be.  There’s an element to which doing the work of an over worked, under resourced researcher can pay dividends.  Don’t just have a story, have an item that is fully formed and which fits the format of the programme.  The only way you can do that is by actually knowing how the programme treats stories like yours.  You won’t always get it right but you’ll get more respect and stand a better chance of building a relationship and having your calls taken again if you know their output.

A few years ago a charity for which I worked had a big fundraising event and wanted to try and get on a leading TV magazine programme.  A researcher’s going to think “so what?  Every charity has big fundraising events”.  So I sat down with the media team and we created an item that worked for the format of the show and then persuaded a high profile celebrity to agree in principle to participate before we pitched it to the programme.  Guess what – they went for it.

In the days of iPlayer and online catch-up TV services there really is no excuse for a media team not to know how Daybreak, The One Show, BBC Breakfast, Lorraine, This Morning, The Alan Titchmarsh Show, The Jeremy Vine Show or You and Yours work.

….Oh and if a colleague comments on you sitting in the office watching This Morning on your computer tell them it’s work – honestly!

Who's kidding Who

Just written a new little blog post about Dr Who, the BBC and breaking the rules for the Guardian Voluntary Sector Network.  Check it out here.

Is Managing Celebrities a volunteer's job?

Celebrity relationships are tricky things.  They require tact, finesse, and a level of understanding of their world.  You need to be able to research those who might be relevant for your cause and keep track of their careers as well as keeping in contact in a relevant and planned way.

This is not a job for the faint hearted.  As any agent will tell you they receive hundreds of requests every week for some of their clients so making sure your request is relevant is vital.  Hiring someone who gets all this and is capable of acting as a productive interface between the celebrity and the charity is essential.

Too often charities don’t get it as I’ve written in various blogposts such as:

• The Myth of the Little Black Book - why thinking that someone needs to have a contacts book if they’re to be of use to a charity
• Celebs, Runs & Treks
• We Love You…. We Love You Not - about building & sustaining relationships
• Tweet Off about using Twitter to gain celebrity support
• The Case of the Missing Credit – understanding just one of the perils of being a celebrity manager

and in a post on the Guardian Voluntary Sector Network Why TV quiz shows don't really care about charities.

So with all these things to think about and the problems of dealing with celebs and their people you’d imagine that’d it would be difficult to find the right person for the post, and to be honest it is.  I’m shocked at how little some charities want to pay for this skillset.  One charity is currently advertising a role for only £28k.

However today I was blown away to find that Livability thinks this is the job for a Volunteer!  Ignoring the fact that you’ll be entrusting personal and sensitive information to this person (in my organisation access to celebrity records is very tightly controlled) this is about building long term relationships.  The probability of getting someone who’s willing to do this for several years unpaid has to be incredibly low.

Whilst I understand that for small charities it is incredibly hard to justify a full time salary this is not the way to go.  What many do is give one of the media team the extra responsibility for handling celebrities or hire in a consultant either for a day or more a week, or even on a project by project basis.  If you need advice on how to get started with celebrities the Media Trust holds regular workshops on working with celebrities.

Whatever you do, in my opinion. putting important high level relationships in the hands of a volunteer is complete madness.  But if you think I’m wrong feel free to comment.

By George they've got it - not!

It’s been a celebfest of charity this weekend with the Comic Relief juggernaut delivering not only its third instalment of ‘Let’s Dance’ but also the worldwide internet sensation ’24 Hour Panel People’ in which David Walliams appeared on 19 consecutive panel shows over 24 hours.

So naturally I’m going to blog about something much smaller as I do like being perverse.  It’s hard to gain celebrity support – just ask the folks across the charity sector who make it look easy; and once you’ve got it, it’s difficult to maintain and develop.  Some of the most committed supporters are those who have an affinity with the cause.

I’m particularly sympathetic to small charities which are founded by people who themselves have experienced a problem and work doggedly to support others going through the same thing.  A classic example was Bob Woodward who founded CLIC (now CLIC Sargent).

I’ve talked about the use of Twitter by charities before in Tweet Off! but was disappointed to be sent this tweet that was spotted by a friend recently:

My friend’s comment? “Ridiculous”.

It’s from a very small charity.  It shows a lack of understanding which seems common across the sector.

I won’t identify the charity as is it’s so small that I doubt it has any paid staff and is run by a group of parents whose children share a rare and horrible condition.  Having done a lot of research on them I have a great deal of sympathy for what they do but I have to concur with the ‘Ridiculous’ comment. 

So why is it ridiculous?  They want to align their brand with that of a celebrity – a perfectly reasonable idea.  The problem is that they think they can do this with the celeb doing nothing and that they will still raise awareness.

Firstly it would be impossible for a patron to do nothing.  At very least they would have to agree to support the charity, approve the use of their name and a quote.  They’d also need to supply a photo and possibly a signature. 

However they’d need to do far more if the aim is to raise awareness (as opposed to reinforcing existing supporters).  Whilst the charity has understood that a celebrity endorsement can gain you media coverage the reality is that unless they do media interviews or start tweeting about the cause it is unlikely that they will raise any awareness.

So how would I go about it?  I’d talk to my existing supporters and see if, in their networks, they know someone with a profile – always remembering that if it’s a small local charity where it’s about local coverage you don’t need a national name (think about the ‘stars’ of your local radio station or football club).

If not I’d go away and do lots of research.  Why would someone want to support my organisation?  As I always say, celebrities are people too and frequently support a cause because it is either relevant to them (maybe a family member has been affected) or fits in with an issue about which they are passionate – such as Duncan Bannatyne who is a big advocate of giving up smoking (he’s supporting this Wednesday’s No Smoking Day).

If you’re a charity about children then targeting someone who’s a parent is more likely to gain support.  But imagine you got a lorry load of direct mail every week to support a diverse range of charities. Think about which one you’d pick over another - that’s the decision many celebrities face.  Find a reason to be relevant to the individual you approach. 

But the other thing this charity has missed is that a celebrity is the cherry on the cake, it’s not the cake as another colleague in the industry argues 'the charity liaison who says "happy to give you my expertise but you don't need a celeb" is worth their weight in gold'. There are a huge number of ‘real life’ magazines as well as the women’s pages of newspapers and a really good story about how the condition affects the lives of children and their families could also help raise awareness.

Ooops!

I've posted a new blog over at Guardian Voluntary Sector Network on research that I thought missed the point and stated the obvious at the same time!

Boom! Boom! (with a Kazoo)

Getting into the psyche of the great British Public is something that can really make a fundraising project take off.  You have to hand it to the lovely folks at Comic Relief when it comes to being creative.  After last week’s Inbetweeners Rude Trip they come up with something truly ridiculous.

We love the stupid, the inane.  Just tune in to Radio 4 on a Monday at 6:30pm to hear I’m Sorry I haven’t a Clue.  Well the lovely peeps at Radio 3 have come up with the Big Red Nose Show.  But what’s got Twitter buzzing is that using the audience they’re planning to create the world’s largest Kazoo orchestra – check out #bbckazoo.

The event is hosted by Radio 3’s Katie Derham and of course that classical music stalwart Basil Brush (not that I’m name dropping but I have actual met Basil)!  When I saw the video above it really made me smile.

Of course playing the kazoo is easy and anyone can do it.  But what’s clever is that to help the event along they have a stellar line-up of stars who, coincidentally I’m sure, happen to have popular twitter accounts and spurred on today by Emma Freud.

Nice use of social media and a silly idea that engages people.  I’d be amazed if they didn’t sell out and break the world record. Mind you when I said the Inbetweeners would do well they crashed their car!

If in doubt resort to smut!

From Jules and Sandy, through Are You Being Served to Julian Clary, who famously liked a warm hand on his entrance, there’s nothing we Brits like more than a smutty innuendo.  It probably goes back to the very earliest days of Music Hall.

We’re also a bit of a fan of the underdog or the awkward geek.  Not for us the All American Football Hero and the Homecoming Queen.  So it seems like the peeps over at Comic Relief should be onto a winner with The Inbetweeners Rude Road Trip.

In simple terms it’s four guys in a car trying to visit 50 places with rude place names in 50 hours.  Naturally it’s being filmed and the end result will be available to download from iTunes for £1.89.  This is the video trailer:

What’s good about this project is that it engages with the social media generation.  There’s a chance to ‘join in’ – at the time of writing over 5,000 people had put comments and suggestions for Britain’s rudest place names on their Facebook page.

But not only have they got Facebook going they’ve also got the Twitterati enthused.  Check out #rudetrip. Plus they’re keeping followers up to date by posting pics as they go – here’s an example (although not suitable for lovers of House Elves).

So that’s: 

1. Great celebs for the target audience (tick)
2. Interactivity on Facebook AND Twitter (tick)
3. Keeping people engaged & making them comeback (tick)
4. Raising money….ahhh, we don’t know yet

My general feeling is that social media doesn’t deliver when it comes to fundraising.  Just look at the disaster of Last Tweet and Testament.  In that case around 70% of the US$1m fundraising target came from one donor.

This is different.  Firstly there’s the video to download.  At less than the price of a Starbucks Latte I can see that doing well – it’s a pocket money price. Given the audience that seems like a good price point AND you get something in return.  I have to confess to being a little surprised that when I went to the donation page the amount had been filled in with a suggested £40.  Call me a cheapskate but that seemed a little high.  Since I’m not a fundraiser I’ll just assume that Comic Relief know what they’re doing. [Since writing this the suggested donation amount has changed to £10]

All in all, if they got no press coverage and didn’t transmit something on telly, I’d be amazed if this project didn’t do well (probably the kiss of death – a bit like Richard predicting who’s going to win on Pointless [see my blog on Guardian Voluntary Sector Network to understand that]).  The point I’m making here is that this would work for any charity, not just the big rollercoaster that is Comic Relief.  It’s the creativity behind the idea and the clever use of social media that makes this so strong.

Guardian Voluntary Sector Network

In case you don't already read it I've just written a piece for the Guardian Voluntary Sector Network - you can read it by clicking here. It's all about getting cerlebrities on to quiz shows.