Great PR ideas often come from making connections

As this blog post attests, Steve Jobs has come up with some great quotes in his time. This one particularly stands out for me:

“Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That’s because they were able to connect experiences they’ve had and synthesize new things. And the reason they were able to do that was that they’ve had more experiences or they have thought more about their experiences than other people.”

Why is this compelling? It highlights what all marketers should be doing – connecting the public consciousness with their brand in a memorable way. Sometimes you are able to come up with something new that people didn’t know they wanted until you showed it to them (iPad, anyone?), but mainly it’s about tapping into something that has already started. And you can’t muck about; if you do, someone will beat you to the punch or the moment will have passed.

To give an example, Bullet PR held a press conference for Rebel Sport at which the CEO announced a price-drop on All Black replica jerseys. Not that groundbreaking as a PR idea, that is until you connect it with the fact that it coincided with a time when
a mass of public resentment was building at the inflated cost of the item. The result? Rebel Sport is the hero of the Kiwi everyman because they captured a moment in time and owned it in the right way.

Image courtesy of dunechaser.