Is all publicity good publicity?

Recently I have been focusing on the social media for the Business School, generating content for the School’s Facebook and Twitter accounts (don’t forget to like and follow ;). 

As part of the daily research activity I stumbled upon the responses to the Protein World’s “Are You Beach Body Ready” campaign reactions. There were a number of incidents where people have made their own corrections to the ads found on London Underground, making the hash tag #eachbodysready popular across social media networks.

At first I was very excited, motivated and inspired to see such movement against people’s beliefs as I thought it shows “people power,” gives a voice to the audience and empowers the community. People argued that the adverts promote an unhealthy body image, and a petition against the campaign has collected over 40,000 sign-ups. 

Later I read that “despite the negative response to the adverts, sales of the company’s products had increased”, and I thought isn’t this buzz actually helping the publicity of the company and its products? I guess that it might be true that any publicity is good publicity. 

According to Stanford Business (2011), “Negative publicity can increase sales when a product or company is relatively unknown simply because it stimulates product awareness” (Protein World was formed in 2012 so it is relatively new). Even now to write this article I am looking for more information about the company, so that proves the point above. 

How the response is handled is another topic. Protein World has not been that diplomatic in their social media responses, which probably created even more buzz about the brand. Who knows, it might turn against them later. 

So there are 2 main points for me in this story:

1. The power of the society, and community empowerment; I am impressed how many people have jumped on the #eachbodysready campaign and supported the message of being comfortable in your own skin, no matter how you look.
2. If you are a new organisation, do not get put down by some negative publicity as in reality, it actually might be positive for your brand.