Porn bailouts and publicity – find your angle and work it

Posted by Jeremy L. Knauff on January 9th, 2009 in Viral Marketing

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It’s sad really, that anyone even considered for a second that Larry Flynt might be serious when he discussed the government bailing out the porn industry. Despite the ridiculous bail out mania that we seem to be in, even our almost useless congress (with an approval rating hovering below 15%) would not be moronic enough to approve that sort of thing.

Flynt knew that he never had even the slightest shred of hope that he would see any money from the government. His intent wasn’t to get a hand out, even though he still claims that he’s serious. It was to generate massive publicity without spending much money, and at that, he was massively successful. As soon as the story began spreading around, everyone took it at face value, including reporters (who seem reluctant to actually check facts these days anyway), and before long, he had achieved nationwide media coverage for next to nothing.

My point is that any business can do this, though it will probably take place on a much smaller scale. You just need to find an outrageous angle, and work it. To really get a significant outcome, it you should look at finding a way to motivate people to talk about it. Cater to their self interest. All that you need is a few people talking about your story, because they tell a few people, who then tell a few more people and the viral nature of human communication takes over.