I am writing this just before the England V Denmark game so, let’s assume they are Good PR if they won or if not, let’s give Gareth Bad PR for a poor team selection. Aside from the football, what an action-packed week it has been in PR Land.

First Good PR

Dominic Cummings

My first Good PR has to go to Dominic Cummings who had the digital PR brigade eventually swooning with delight at his approach to getting links to his blog. At first though, the trendy “new” digital PR bunch were pouring scorn on Big D, one of the bastions of traditional PR, for his “Oi - there is no link to my blog” attempts at link building. The BBC reporter replied though, and he even went on to give Dom the link that he craved. I hear the Cision/Gorkana blog post been written already; “The 10 types of Oi subject line that can get you links”.

First Bad PR

Aled Jones

The first Bad PR goes to one of the world’s favourite former child-warblers, Aled Jones. His sloppy or weak password management on The Twitter allowed some cheeky wag to hijack his account and post pictures of a bulging pair of budgie smugglers. I gave Aled’s account a quick run through one of the Twitter audience analysis pieces of software we use and his main fan base is females, 65+, so I imagine there were a few hotter than normal Ovaltines that evening.

Second Good PR

Morrisons

Morrisons gets great PR this week courtesy of being the meat in a threesome of potential suitors. Just a few days after the retail giant accepted a big-ticket offer to sell up, two more bids were rumoured to be coming out of the blue and this has made it the darling of the supermarket world.

Morrisons’ PR team has not really had to do anything proactive to garner all of the positive PR, but that may well change if, as I predict, Amazon swoops in to make a cash offer and add it to its stable of relatively recent grocery-related acquisitions. Considering that, until at least five years ago, Morrisons was considered to just be a Northern pie flogger, this is quite the brand turnaround. Kudos.

Third Good PR

Ifor Williams

Another brand that has stumbled into the realms of accidental Good PR is trailer maker, Ifor Williams. In the land of farming and horsey types, eg, where I live, the Ifor Williams brand is more sought after than a pair of Louboutin shoes, but now that Ryan Reynolds and his buddy (yes, I can’t remember his name) bought Wrexham FC, Ifor is always getting big, global, mentions.

This week, Reynolds announced that TikTok was going to be the new shirt sponsor of the team, replacing Ifor Williams, however, the trailer company was going to be remaining as part of the family and becoming the main shorts sponsor. This story went truly global courtesy of TikTok spreading the word and Ifor gladly went along with a nice supporting statement.

Second Bad PR

Scheming teenagers

The final Bad PR goes to a rebel group of teenagers who have been using media websites to spread the word on how to get a positive Covid test. This sophisticated attempt to skive off is far more intelligent than my fake letters from my parents announcing the death of another imaginary distant relative and needing a day off. For those interested, apparently fizzy drinks and lemon juice are the tools that are needed, although the game is almost up as lab-coat clad boffins from around the world are scrambling to fix the issue. I am sure further initiatives and solutions will be found by the kids of today.

Written by Andy Barr, owner of 10 Yetis Digital. Seen any good or bad PR lately? Abuse and contradictory points welcomed over on The Twitter @10Yetis or andy@10Yetis.co.uk on email