How The EU Referendum Was An Embarrassment To PR

‘Scaremongering’ has been the most popular term used in the media to describe the EU Referendum campaigns over this last month. Instead of facts and logical debate, we were served frightening threats to our jobs by the ‘hysterical’ Remain side, and pure racism from the Leave side. While the Remain was dubbed ‘Project Fear’ for instilling panic into the public by warning of the possibility of World War 3, anyone who dared speak out as a Leave supporter was labelled ‘racist’ and ‘selfish‘.  Not only was the communication of the debate misleading and downright embarrassing, but the way the public reacted was despicable. In the end, an MP lost her life, the Leave voters realised they were promised a lie, and the level of hate crime has since risen by 57%.

 

Contently lists anger and fear as two of the six emotions that can influence in advertising, and it looks like these were the only focus of the debate. In a referendum that determined the future of the country, the government chose shock advertising. Rewind to 2012 when the Leveson Inquiry was set up to regulate the press in the wake of the phone-hacking scandal, and it makes you wonder how did it get to this? The media circus that surrounded all this was alight with lies and only added to the turmoil.

 

 

Last year PR Week published that 70% of the public don’t trust PR practitioners because ‘they lie’. Practitioners have been trying to remove themselves from the ‘spin doctor’ image, but this recent campaign seems like a huge step backwards. And since the result on Friday, it has only grown worse. Within hours the value of the pound decreased and moral panic began – the prime minister stepped down, Nigel Farage admitted that most of his campaign was a mistake lie, Corbyn’s party disbanded and stories of racial abuse started to circulate.

 

Is it any wonder that 64% of the 18-24 generation, the ones who would live with this decision, didn’t actually vote? Yik Yak was full of Manchester students unsure of which way to vote, not knowing what to believe, all trust in the country’s leaders lost. Buzzfeed had a live stream on Facebook with David Cameron in which a girl basically told him to fuck off, and Channel 4 screened a total shambles debate where media personalities didn’t really seem to know what they were talking about. There was even a live stream on Facebook from Bite the Ballot where a hip hop artist rapped about the EU Referendum, and I cringed as the number of viewers dropped rapidly. It’s less about being ‘down with the kids’ and more about just answering questions with real facts.

 

In conclusion, the same ‘spin’ and propaganda that gave Public Relations a bad name in the past was dug up during this referendum, and the media circus is not leaving town soon. Preying on the public’s fears, lying and inspiring hate has only distanced the people from their leaders. I only hope the future of PR in politics will learn from this.

What You Can Learn From Free Burritos

Last week Manchester’s newest burrito chain Chilango opened up its restaurant on Oxford Street to a queue of hundreds of people, predominantly students, who were waiting for one thing and one thing only: free burritos.

The Manchester Evening News had stirred excitement with the promise of free burritos all day and, as poor students coming to the end of their academic year, this was a dream come true. Among students it is consensus that there are only two ways to perfect happiness, and that is either pizza or burritos.

From before the doors opened at 12pm, the band started up on the corner (face-painted with sugar skulls) and the queue began. People were recording their wait on Snapchat and Twitter, dancing to the music and whatsapping their friends desperately; “where are you?! The queue is moving! Quick!”

At the door customers were given a menu for future visits, and they got to admire the brightly coloured graffiti and posters inside while a girl passed down the queue to keep up the morale and tell people what they could order. Mexican wrestlers and dancers then entertained the crowd, and the service at the counter was record fast (27 seconds). At their tables, people were taking photos and sharing on social media their free meal of the day. After they had eaten, customers were often a taste of nachos and dips on their way out, and then they were tweeting their experience.

All in all, this event has given the new restaurant a mammoth of exposure on its first day. What can be taken from Chilango’s success is that the event must have enough to keep people interested and to share on social media. Not only for the purpose of social media, but it must be something that customers will be getting their friends to go with them, an experience that the group can each share, and this will mean more social media marketing between them, free publicity.