Stun with your Stunts!

What is a PR stunt?

How do you get your brand or cause noticed and attract positive media coverage? How do you guarantee a good return on investment (ROI) in earned media for PR campaigns?

The answer may be vague, but the public will do the heavy lifting for you if the PR stunts are executed in a well-planned and organised manner.

It might sound easy, but it is sometimes hard for companies to design successful PR stunts that highlight a message instead of burying it. The importance of stunts is in their generating interest and awareness for the concept, product, or service being marketed.

Here are some important points that need to be taken into consideration when coming up with a stunt if you want it to reach the right audience and generate the desired outcome:

1. Be a pioneer – Try not to copy what others did; come up with a unique stunt that resonates and can create a buzz.
2. Make use of an event – This need not be a major holiday like Eid or Christmas. Any event that is projected to create news coverage will grant you an instant advantage.
3. Break a world record – This always attracts the public’s attention. The Guinness World Record’s website has a section devoted to entities getting involved in new or existing records.
4. Make it big – Make sure you create something impressive if you want to generate a buzz and become the talk of the town.
5. Work with influencers/celebrities – Though not a cheap option, such collaborations will guarantee a wide audience reach and publicity.

Stunning Stunts

Here, I will go through some successful and trending stunts that took the world by storm:

1. Barbie reimagined on her 60th birthday to show her real age – To celebrate the beauty of growing older, Lumen — a dating site for singles over 50 — paid homage to Barbie on her born day.
2. La Caja installed billboards that illuminated dangerous roads at night – The Argentinian company chose some of the most dangerous roads and curves in the country and installed advertising billboards that lit up the road instead of the actual billboard during the night.
3. Britain’s youngest pilot offered mentorship by EasyJet – After 16-year-old Ellie Carter became the youngest solo-powered aircraft pilot in Britain, EasyJet offered her a mentorship to help fulfil her career aspirations.

Deliveroo’s homage to the ‘Friends’ meat trifle

For the 14th anniversary of the final episode of Friends in 2018, Deliveroo decided to return to one of the show’s most infamous meals: Rachel’s glorious meat trifle.

This was a quick glimpse at some of the most tending PR stunts that caught my attention. With this blog, I set out to explain the importance and the value that PR stunts create and how it could become a mandate in our ever-evolving world of communication.

Khaled Abu Hishme is Account Director at Cicero & Bernay Public Relations, an independent PR agency headquartered in Dubai offering new-age public relations consultancy to the UAE and across the MENA region. | www.cbpr.me