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The Today Programme on Radio Four has released a viral video which is actually very funny in a wry fashion rather than a ROFL way (…that’s ‘roll on the floor laughing’, please note Jim & John).   Given that Today is a radio programme they unsurprisingly focus on the presenters’ wardrobe requirements, but there are some good lines, not least when the head of hair, make-up and wardrobe refers to Jim “Nokkertie”.

The experiment points out a couple of things.  Viral can spread very fast…if I type quick enough this post will be up on PR Media Blog before the programme in which it was mentioned has finished (I’ve got 22 minutes).  Secondly, in the excitement about new media and new marketing we must not underestimate the power of mainstream media brands.  What makes this viral interesting and what is promoting its spread is the Today programme itself.  Now there are few greater bastions of mainstream media than that.     

The battle lines are drawn; the forces of good and evil face one another across the cosmos; the advertising space has been bought. Let the mortal scrap for our souls begin!

The Atheist Bus campaign has taken to the streets of London, propogating the idea that “There’s probably no God…now stop worrying and enjoy your life.” The whole idea began as a blog post by writer, Ariane Sherine (ex-Sunday school attendee) which mushroomed into a call for donations to pay for an atheist advertising campaign to rival the Christian public transport campaign that inspired Sherine’s ire.

According to the Guardian’s report today, the campaign has the backing of Richard Dawkins, author of The God Delusion, the British Humanist Association, philospher AC Grayling among others.

Meanwhile, the Church of England is being no slacker in fighting back for the forces of religion, by devising a Prayer on Being Made Redundant plus a Prayer For Those Remaining in the Workplace, which even had a reading on Radio 4’s PM programme last night. Call me cynical (and an atheist if you like), but isn’t that capitalising on the human fall-out from the credit crunch?

PR Media Blog picked up on the Churches Advertising Network nativity campaign back in December, so clearly the strange bedfellows of religion and marketing communications are very much in cahoots.

*Update - A complaint is made to the Advertising Standards Authority by Christian Voice stating that the Atheist Bus Campaign needs to substantiate its “There’s probably no God” slogan. I suspect this one is going to run and run…

**Update 2 - and it has. Radio 4 will run its first atheist Thought for the Afternoon, to balance out the Today programme’s daily faith-based Thought for the Day.

When the story broke on the terror attacks in Mumbai there was much talk of news spreading through blogs and social networks like Twitter.  Details of the siege were reported minute by minute by people who were there.  There is no doubt that the rise in citizen journalism and the availability of these channels has provided a new layer of news sourcing where information comes fast and direct.

It was the medium of radio however that brought the events into vivid and immediate focus.  As the siege was taking place Jim Naughtie on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme conducted an extraordinary interview.  Business lawyer Mark Abell was barricaded in his room inside the Oberoi hotel whist the murder and mayhem was taking place.  “As I entered my room there was a massive blast …and the gunfire has been going on throughout the night” he said, ”there is no escape and we haven’t heard anything from anybody.”  The immediacy and reality of the situation along with Mark’s stoic bravery was evident throughout.Mark escaped and was interviewed again on Today, 24 hours later.  He described his release and the full horror of the carnage he saw when he was escorted under armed guard through the lobby of the hotel.

Radio can deliver insight that text or still image based channels never can.   I have always been persuaded by the views of Gary Carter of FremantleMedia who argues that so called ‘old media’ are not replaced by new they continue co-exist.  He argues  ”The only mass communication medium in history to have been replaced by another is the telegraph and …arguably, of course, the telegram was not a mass communication technology.”

We need to stop thinking of media in terms of “newness” and think more in terms of “richness”.   We can be seduced by something shiny and new and but we must still celebrate that which we already have.

What do you call a Skoda with a sun roof? A skip! (dumpster, if you’re a US reader)

Such jokes, unthinkable about Skoda cars now, were testament to the failure of a company to manage its appalling brand image. Certainly, the product didn’t help. But as Spencer mused on Twitter, Skoda moved from “embarrassing purchase to surprisingly good cars” - a “transformational brand”.

But “brand” - that word is everywhere. “So what, dummy?” you might say, and rightly so; working in PR, the concept should be a given.

But now that brands and branding seem to have entered the common vernacular - Top20 Coolest Brands reported in the Daily Star, a compendium of wise words from the experts in the Sunday Times’ business section, and even mid-evening radio programmes devoted to it on BBC Radio 4 - has the concept lost something? Is the alchemy of branding devalued by the possibility that Joe Public is “in on it”?

A useful definition from an unlikely source, legal news site Lawdit Reading Room, says “Many decisions about brands are made by customers emotionally or intuitively rather than rationally”. I never bought into that, reckoning my buying decisions were driven by the head (or, more often, the stomach), not heart. But recalling a trip to the USA, I realised that a brand journey was pure, unbridled emotion:

1. Book Florida/Disney/beach holiday with Virgin in one easy transaction: LOVE Virgin!

2. Arrived to find hotel atrocious - actually fearing for life - and Virgin reps couldn’t give a hoot: HATE HATE HATE Virgin!

3. Pour out heart to waiter at Hard Rock Cafe who vows to help us out: LOVE Hard Rock Cafe!

4. Move to Disney resort hotel. Previously HATE Disney because of prolonged exposure to son’s favourite Lion King soundtrack. Now, LOVE fabulous Disney hotel, even with Inca-themed restaurant.

5. Return flight to UK on same day as discovery of international liquid bomb plot. But, Virgin allows  me onto plane with contact lens fluids. LOVE LOVE LOVE Virgin!

I suppose that whether punters grasp a product’s “brand essence” or not, if you can get hold of their heart strings their purse strings will follow.