Organisation: Cliff Richard Organisation
Issue: The Millennium Prayer number one record campaign
At: www.cliffrichard.org
A mere 12 months ago, PR Week reported on Mark Borkowski PR’s campaign
to transform perennial pop-favourite Sir Cliff Richard into a hip,
contemporary star.
Now it seems conceivable that the singer may have yet another Christmas
number one with his song Millennium Prayer, released by Papillon
Records.
Like previous offerings from Sir Cliff, Millennium Prayer was
blacklisted from radio playlists, but the team at Mark Borkowski PR has
done an admirable job in ensuring that the great British public know of
the record - even without being able to hear it.
Now Sir Cliff has joined the cyber-age with the launch of his new,
official web site.
But prior to the web site launch, he was already using the internet.
Papillon Records founder Mike Andrews has attributed a certain amount of
Millennium Prayer’s success to its net strategy, although he was quoted
in the Daily Telegraph saying: ’I can’t say too much about that as it
might assist the competition.’
But Mark Borkowski does shed some light on the dual-strategy internet
campaign. One side was a continuation of the traditional media campaign,
carried out by the team at Mark Borkowski, focusing on internet news
links.
The other side was particularly innovative. Papillon Records used the
internet to target on-line fan groups, of which there are many. The idea
was to ’activate’ the fans individually, e-mailing them with news about
the single’s release which they could spread, in turn, to fellow fans,
creating a strategic record buying movement.
Yahoo’s search engine reveals one site (www.starnet.
com.au/sheppard/2cliff.html) on which Millennium Prayer is featured.
With its links to fans across the world, it’s not hard to see how the
record company could have used fan groups for the campaign.
Cliff’s own web site has now also joined the fray, featuring news and
events including information on his ’Countdown to the Millennium’
concert series which begins in Birmingham on 17 December.
It is a beautifully designed site, with biographical information and a
message from the man himself. Millennium Prayer is mentioned
extensively, highlighting the fact that profits go to Children in Need
and pointing out that it its lyrics would make it a suitably weighty
number one single for this time of year.
It’s inconceivable that, with God and PR on his side, Sir Cliff could
actually fail. But should Millennium Prayer be knocked off the number
one spot before Christmas, Borkowski confides that there are further PR
plans to support the record to make it the first number one of the new
millennium.
