And that, my friends, is Newsjacking at its finest.
Let me ask you this:
How many names do you remember from the Miss USA Pageant? One. The winner.
OK… actually probably zero. The Miss USA pageant is old, outdated and boring. The winner’s name shoots through the news when she first wins, everyone looks up her old pics and then sits back and waits for Trump to manufacture a scandal. Well, Donnie-boy, don’t be mad that this bright, young lady flipped your own game on you!
Newsjacking is, according to author David Meerman Scott, the process by which you inject your ideas or angles into breaking news, in real-time, in order to generate media coverage for yourself or your business.
Great book. Quick read. I definitely recommend it for anyone looking into using social media for publicity.
By being acutely aware of your market and acting fast, you can essentially use other news stories to latch on and gain traction for your message. Scott mentions examples in the ebook where companies have taken traditional stories about Eliot Spitzer or Barack Obama and spun them to the point of being the #2 story on a Google search, only behind the actual story itself.
So who is the story now? Trump? The actual winner of the pageant? Nope. Sheena Monnin. Former Miss Pennsylvania. Well done.
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Brendan: A great example! I saw this on the news too and the lead was not who won but the allegations of rigging. Thanks for advancing the concept of newsjacking by highlighting this!