Friday, July 12, 2013

Terrible marketing stunt turned into terrible marketing press release

There was a thing earlier in the week about how Durex were supposedly marketing Daft Punk themed Get Lucky condoms.

It turns out they're not, but like a drunk man hopefully filling his pockets from the Johnny machine in the bogs, Durex are hoping they can capitalise on a promise. Can you spot the moment when their email to MTV News turns from factual correction into jolly-marketing message?

We are aware of reports that Durex has launched Daft Punk branded condoms following their hit single 'Get Lucky,' " he said. "There is no Durex promotion or partnership with Daft Punk in the U.S. or any other markets and Durex is not posting free packs to the world's top DJs as suggested. However, we do hope that by using Durex condoms, music-lovers will continue to make sweet music together and have great sex!"
They might have just got away with it if they'd stopped after "make sweet music together", but you can just picture the room when that statement was hammered together...

- Do you think people will understand what we mean by 'make sweet music'?
- Yeah, Dave, I think they will
- Are you sure? It might be a bit subtle.
- It's not subtle, Dave. It'll be fine
- But what if people don't know what condoms are for?
- Look, Dave, you might have spent the first six weeks on this account thinking we were selling tiny sandwich bags, but most people will get it
- I think we really need to make it clear we want people to have sex with our condoms on
- Dave...
- No, seriously. We don't want to get sued if people take it literally, and put our condoms on their flutes and whistles and the lubricant destroys their instruments. Let's just add 'by doing sex into the condoms peniswise' to make it clear
- Dave, this is like the time you wanted us to rebrand as Durex Penis Covers. It's not necessary
- I'm not going to sign this off until you amend it
- Okay, Dave...


1 comment:

James said...

Speaking of horrible PR stunts and press releases, have you seen that dog of a story about 'most frequently-misheard lyrics' that's been doing the rounds? I wasn't too surprised when it first turned up on Digital Spy - They'd publish a pizza delivery menu if you stuck a photo of Peter Andre to it - but then it turned up on the BBC News site :( http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-23284179

Apparently a survey of 1350 people has found that the most-misheard lyric is by the Eurythmics - It claims a third of people surveyed thought the line was "Sweet dreams are made of cheese". It also reckons the second-most-misheard is Rihanna supposedly singing "We found Dove in a soapless place".

There was something particularly irritating about this story, more so than the average survey-as-cheap-PR-where-news-used-to-be piffle. How does this sort of survey work? Did they ask 1350 people "What lyrics do you mishear?" and then hope that lots of them suggest the same ones? And isn't a survey of misheard lyrics a bit like asking people to name all the countries they've never heard of?

But mainly; That Rihanna one. Really?? In a song called 'We Found Love', people actually thought she was singing 'We found Dove'? They honestly think we'll believe that many people confused an 'L' sound with a 'D'? I suspect they're talking boddocks.

Sorry, I appear to be ranting in a comment box. Bad habit.

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