College Basketball, MLB, NBA teams, New York Times, Olympics, Washington Post

Mets Get Major Exposure For A Minor Partner

PR Move of the Day:  Those in PR and sales are always looking to find ways to squeeze out even the smallest of exposure for every one of their partners, and especially in major markets, those big hits can be very difficuly to come by.  The diligent publicists will find the notes columns, the blogs and make use of controlled media and then use those as platforms to build equity.  However the big hit usually involves unusual timing, a strong pitch, good relationships with the media and diligent and persistent credibility by those doing the pitching.  A great case of the moon and the stars aligning fell with the New York Mets this week, who found a great angle and the right writer and pitch to land a partnership piece on Kozy Shack Pudding in the advertising section of the New York Times.   The piece had everything one would want…a good spin, third party endorsements, fan interplay in a light manner, messaging from the brand spokesperson and a great signage shot.  Now was it a bit tongue in cheek?  Yes.  But to land such a secondary brand that type of exposure justifies the expendature by Kozy Shack and shows all brands associated with the Mets how much the team will work to get its partners exposure.  Well placed big hit.

Some other good reads…Peter Yoon’s Morning briefing in the LA Times often turns up slices of the offbeat, and is a good example of how brands can land unusual notes…today’s sampling talks about EA Sports use of the wrong national anthem for Northern Ireland,  Notre Dame honoring Lou Holtz and a funny story about former Auburn football coach Pat Dye…George Solomon’s Sunday Washington Post column is always a good read for DC area sports, and this week he has a great q and a with Wizards owner Abe Pollin…Gary Washburn’s Sonics blog in the Seattle PI has a good lookat what the city of Seattle has to do now if it wanted to get another NBA team...another sign of the impact of the economy on sports comes from Lexington, where the University of Kentucky basketball museum is closing its doors…and lastly, Jason Whitlock in the KC Star has a solid read on Olympic swimming qualifier and 41 year old mom Dara Torres.