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Newsjacking Chris Christie

I write about strategies to turn fans into customers and customers into fans. I also share ways to use real-time strategies to spread ideas, influence minds, and build business.

Case Studies  |  Marketing  |  US Presidential Campaign Marketing & PR  |  Newsjacking  |  Best Practices

Chris Christie NYSC newsjackOn Saturday, I presented at the Tony Robbins Business Mastery event in Palm Beach. The event was amazingly high energy! I enjoyed every moment I was there.

During my talk to the 1,000 enthusiastic entrepreneurs, I shared the strategy of newsjacking, the art of how to inject your ideas into a breaking news story and generate tons of attention for your business.

I always like to discuss the news story of the day, so I brought up New Jersey Governor Chris Christie and the ongoing scandal surrounding the lane closures of the George Washington Bridge.

At the time of my talk on Saturday, I had yet to see anybody newsjack the Chris Christie story, but I put myself out there by predicting that Sports International Holdings, the operator of fitness centers including New York Sports Clubs, Boston Sports Clubs, Philadelphia Sports Clubs and Washington Sports Clubs would be among the first.

I shared their terrific newsjacking of Miley Cyrus, Paula Dean, Charlie Sheen, and Kim Jong-un as examples. (See below for images.)

Newsjacking Chris Christie

Today I saw it in my local Boston Globe newspaper. And it is pure brilliance: “Don’t worry Chris, our members stop traffic too.”

This ad works great because it doesn’t take the obvious route and focus on Christie’s weight. Instead it focuses on Boston Sports Club members looking good. Love it.

While newsjacking as I define it involves posting free content such as a blog post, video, or Tweet to get the attention or the media and your buyers for free, the technique works with paid advertising like this too because it gets people talking about your brand. This smallish ad (about 9 inches by 6 inches), will generate much more attention than a generic product based ad of much larger (and more expensive) size.

Over time, people like me come to expect these ads when a public figure ends up in the news and it becomes a big story. I was waiting for this and they delivered.

Oh, and these ads got me to join Boston Sports Club about a year ago. So they work to build business as well as awareness!

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UPDATE 1/15 at 3:00 pm - Last night on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon was this awesomeness now on YouTube. Bruce Springsteen & Jimmy Fallon: "Gov. Christie Traffic Jam" ("Born To Run" Parody)

UPDATE 1/16 at 9:00 am - The New York Sports Club Chris Christie ad is starting to hit the news. Here are WPIX-TV reporters talking about it. New York Sports Club piles on with new Christie Bridgegate ad.

NYSC newsjacking