Celebrity PR
Aahhh..back from a small holiday break… I hope you are all doing great and all that holiday jazz.
In today’s post I’d like to discuss a bit the latest celebrity breakdown and how this is intricately related to branding. Donald Trump and Rosie O’Donnell have been fighting back and forth, for a very immature reason in my opinion, on mainstream media. I was inspired to post this after reading Elaine Fogel’s article on this today at MarketingProfs.com.
In a nutshell, Rosie criticized The Donald’s decision on keeping Miss USA around after she was allegedly abusing alcohol and drugs. After that everything just went berserk! The fight included some quite old fashioned name-calling, in what seems to be the latest TV Bitching Episode.
I’ll try to connect this to the wonderful world of brand marketing. It’s not that tough, actually. A celebrity is a brand. Their name, their looks, personality, people they hang out with, products or services they endorse, etc.
That said, what a big brand meltdown! Both Donald Trump and Rosie O’Donnell have always had gossip trouble, but apparently this time is much more grave. Their PR agencies must be going crazy trying to stop them from opening their wide mouths again; and trying to repair the done damage.
As a brand manager (in this case both the celeb and the PR agency), even the most small details must be thoughtfully planned out and cared for. As for what happened, I’m calling out Trump’s actions to be very un-smart (especially for someone who talks so much about being smart, let’s remind him of the relevancy factor), and completely unnecessary. He was getting pretty much excellent press for the decision he took regarding Miss USA; and he had to come destroy it (HIMSELF) and made it worse.
This is where true smarts come in. Donald Trump, thinking about his celeb-value and brand-like equity, should have taking the high moral stand. Smiling and accepting Rosie’s comment would have been the easiest choice; not a submissive one that would decrease Trump’s honesty factor, but one of maturity and humility (which he is seriously lacking right now). Hopefully the fight is OVER, because although it’s been out there everywhere, I don’t think consumers are waiting for the next magazine cover on it. Let’s get it over with.
