#badpr

You are serving me your head on a silver plater.

Melon Notebooks (@melon4note) claims persmission to reproduce the artwork of the late DeviantArt/IG artist, @Qinni. 

In the screenshot Melon uses as proof of permission, there is absolutely none given to them. 

Liars and thieves or just a bunch of people who suck at their job?  There’s no excuse for either. Melon Notebooks is BLACKLISTED.

In his reaction to Kuan’s post, Robin Goh, Chief Branding and Communications Officer of Singapore Post (SingPost), penned a personally motivated, public response to Kuan. I use personally motivated because Goh does not respond as a professional should. Instead, he acts like a digital marketing intern getting into an online cock fight.

If it’s not a funny matter, it shouldn’t be punny either

Goh claims offense at Kuan’s death wishes against SingPost staff. Yet Goh makes a joke about the same by throwing in a pun - ‘grave’. He then proudly points out pun intended. 

In addition, the pun adds sarcasm/condescension and does not show empathy towards’ the customers issue (which was 3 failed delivery/re-delivery attempts). These are not tones an organization’s representative should be using towards a customer, no matter how insensitive the customer may have been. Especially when the company has failed to adequately provide a service. 

It’s the internet. Stop taking it personally.

Goh’s response to Kuan was emotional. As the Chief, that seems strange. I have experienced the bureaucracy of corp. comms in local organizations in Singapore and Goh’s post is perplexing.

I’m confident Kuan’s comments aren’t the worst that Goh has had to deal with.  Wishing death/hell upon others is akin to saying “fuck you” in a multi-cultural community that the concept of death is a big part of. 

It’s rude, yes. It should not have been said in the first place, yes. But this is an emotional customer. Goh is a professional. He should know better. He should act better. 

Yet, in Kuan’s apology letter dated 13 February, he asks that Goh stop asking friends on his personal Facebook page to share the post. 

Why would Goh be trying to push a post - signed off using his professional designation at SingPost - via his personal page? What’s he trying to gain exposure for? Given the media coverage, it looks like he hoped for it to go viral. Lame!

Wanna be a Grammar Nazi? Make sure you pass your English classes first.

To rub salt on the wound, Goh clarifies that Kuan incorrectly used “staffs”. 

Staff vs staff members is a common error in the Singapore workplace. It’s shares ranks with words like revert. 

There is no value in Goh correcting this beyond trying hard to sound “above” Kuan. In fact, it was that correction that motivated this post because Goh’s post contained more grammatical errors than Kuan’s. This post was really written to capture Goh’s emotional ranks for posterity.

Here are the posts:

And Kuan’s apology the next day, as per the Mothership article:

“Dear all,

I’m the one who got myself embroiled in such unnecessary tussle and would like to take this public. I’m deeply sorry for the strongly worded message made to SingPost, after the said three unsuccessful deliveries. I am guilty of such raucous remarks made online. With great and heartfelt regrets, over what I have posted during this critical trying moment where the world needs love and courage to fight against Coronavirus. I accept full responsibility for my actions.

To my family and friends who know me personally, I am truly remorseful.

Mistake learnt, and I hope forgiveness can be given. I would also like to make a kind and sincere request for Mr Robin, the Group Chief Brand & Communications Officer of SingPost, to stop asking his friends on his personal FB account to share the post. I would like to put things behind me and move on from this saga.”

Apple has been clocked for using some underhanded marketing tactics to push the sales of their newer products. There is a class action lawsuit that was recently filed against them in California. Apple allegedly broke the FaceTime app on devices that still run IOS 6 to push consumers to purchase a device that runs on IOS 7 and up. An email exchange between two Apple engineers showed that they rendered IOS 6 devices useless and stated that the only way to fix this issue was to upgrade devices. How will Apple handle the bad PR when this news reaches the masses? Apple consumers are already abuzz all over the internet weighing in on this issue. If this is true it makes you wonder, does Apple do this when all of their new products come out?

Apple’s brand equity lets them do things like this and have the issue blow over in a couple months. This lawsuit may expose some unethical practices that Apple uses, but will it really deter people from Apple products in the long-run? 

Bradley Tomlin

Source:

The Oscars have been in the news ever since the nomination announcements a few weeks ago. However, it is not seeing much positive PR, after  #OscarsSoWhite started trending on Twitter with many questioning why there were no black nominees. Even the likes of Will Smith and his wife are suggesting the boycott the event in protest. Oops.