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Still recovering from the Wal-Mart flogging fiasco, PR firm Edelman seems to have made yet another mistake in its latest blog-centric PR push.
Edelman is now asking that free Vista-loaded laptops that it sent out to A-list bloggers on behalf of its client Microsoft be returned, or given away, after they review the new Microsoft operating system, reports Marketing Pilgrim (via MarketingVox).
The company sent out the laptops without first telling the bloggers, most of whom at first apparently kept the gifts quiet. Microsoft’s change of heart about sending out free PCs ostensibly came about because it did not want its intentions to be misunderstood.
Too little, too late, it seems. Marketing Pilgrim equates Edelman’s initial slip-up and subsequent request to “throwing water on a pan of burning oil, in an attempt to put the fire out.”
Edelman hired Steve Rubel earlier this year in an effort to be on the cutting edge of social media, yet does not seem to have fully benefited from his expertise.
All sectors of the media business will suffer from the weakened economy in 2008 and 2009, with a slump in local advertising particularly hurting newspapers and local TV, according to a new projection from Goldman Sachs.
Broadcast nets will experience…
The New York Times is shuttering its International Herald Tribune site; NYTimes.com will soon host the international news normally reserved for its sister website.
The move is not about cost savings, but rather about growth, NYTimes.com general manager Vivian Schiller…
Unilever’s Vaseline set forth on an unusual research project in a small town in Alaska. Setting up a storefront, the company began giving away free bottles of lotion and asking recipients to name the person who had recommended they come…
Meet the Press, the show hosted by Tim Russert for 17 years before his death last June, is beginning to slip in ratings.
Last month, CBS’s Face the Nation pulled ahead of Meet the Press for the first time in two…
Bloggers collectively create nearly one million blog posts each day, and half of bloggers believe blogs will be a primary source of news and entertainment in the next five years, according to Technorati’s 2008 State of the Blogosphere Report, MarketingCharts writes.…
Wal-Mart and Costco reported same-store gains in September, with sales rising 2.4% and 9% respectively. Sales at Target stores open at least a year fell 3%, writes Retailer Daily.
Below, fiscal results from the discount retail giants:
Sales of food and…
