P.T. Barnum: “There’s No Such Thing as Bad Publicity”

“There’s no such thing as bad publicity.”

Or, how about: “No pub­li­city is bad publicity.”

As PR pro­fes­sion­als, we’ve all heard the expres­sion many times before. But where does it come from? Those infam­ous words were allegedly uttered by P.T. Barnum, a legendary show­man and cir­cus director.

Although veri­fy­ing that P.T. Barnum should be cred­ited is dif­fi­cult, it’s inter­est­ing to learn more about the con­tro­ver­sial legend and bet­ter under­stand why the say­ing per­sists today.

Here we go:

“There’s No Such Thing as Bad Publicity”

Phineas Taylor Barnum: “There’s No Such Thing as Bad Publicity”

Phineas Taylor (P.T.) Barnum was a 19^th-cen­tury American show­man, entre­pren­eur, and politi­cian known for his lar­ger-than-life per­son­al­ity and uncanny abil­ity to cap­ture the pub­lic’s ima­gin­a­tion. Born in 1810 in Bethel, Connecticut, Barnum rose to prom­in­ence in the enter­tain­ment world by found­ing the Barnum & Bailey Circus, dubbed “The Greatest Show on Earth.”

Barnum pion­eered the art of the press agentry mod­el, employ­ing sen­sa­tion­al­ism and pub­li­city stunts to gen­er­ate interest and draw crowds to his shows. His innov­at­ive mar­ket­ing tech­niques and relent­less pur­suit of the extraordin­ary laid the ground­work for many mod­ern pub­lic rela­tions strategies. 

“Phineas Taylor (P.T.) Barnum (1810−1891) was a savvy pub­li­city show­man, one who impacted par­tic­u­lar aspects of pub­lic rela­tions and advert­ising, primar­ily event plan­ning, event pro­mo­tion and true publicity/​media cov­er­age. Ahead of oth­ers in his time, he actu­ally under­stood the import­ance of media cov­er­age (he star­ted New York’s first illus­trated news­pa­per in 1853) and believed ‘there is no such thing as bad pub­li­city,’ a pop­u­lar phrase many times attrib­uted to Barnum him­self.”
Source: Big Communications ¹Foster, A. (2017, January 20). The End of a Publicity Era: How P.T Barnum Affected Marketing and PR. Big Communications. https://​big​com​.com/​2​0​1​7​/​0​1​/​p​t​-​b​a​r​n​u​m​-​m​a​r​k​e​t​i​n​g​-​a​n​d​-​p​u​b​l​i​c​-​r​e​l​a​t​i​o​ns/

Although some crit­ics have labelled Barnum as a pur­vey­or of hoaxes and decep­tion, his endur­ing leg­acy as a vis­ion­ary show­man and mas­ter of spec­tacle con­tin­ues to cap­tiv­ate audi­ences and inspire gen­er­a­tions of enter­tain­ers and entrepreneurs.

Learn more: P.T. Barnum: “There’s No Such Thing as Bad Publicity”

Is Bad Publicity Actually … Good?

Not all pub­li­city is good pub­li­city — of course.

But it’s com­plic­ated, too. Someone’s bad pub­li­city is often good for someone else, and vice versa. Bad pub­li­city for your com­pet­it­or could mean less busi­ness for them and more for you.

There are also con­ver­sion the­ory effects. Suppose a con­tro­ver­sial music artist gets bad pub­li­city for pro­voc­at­ive stage beha­viours. In that case, it might res­ult in angered par­ents, res­ult­ing in teen­agers queueing for hours to see the show.

“Make par­ents angry!”
— Shep Gordon, tal­ent man­ager and film agent ²Supermensch: The Legend of Shep Gordon. (2023, December 18). In Wikipedia. https://​en​.wiki​pe​dia​.org/​w​i​k​i​/​S​u​p​e​r​m​e​n​s​c​h​:​_​T​h​e​_​L​e​g​e​n​d​_​o​f​_​S​h​e​p​_​G​o​r​don

Then, there’s the amp­li­fic­a­tion hypo­thes­is:

This, of course, goes for pub­li­city as well.

However, P.T. Barnum likely referred to anoth­er psy­cho­lo­gic­al aspect of bad pub­li­city (which isn’t often dis­cussed in pub­lic rela­tions or else­where). Sometimes, from a busi­ness per­spect­ive, it’s bet­ter to be infam­ous than entirely unknown.

“People want to be loved; fail­ing that admired; fail­ing that feared; fail­ing that hated and des­pised. They want to evoke some sort of sen­ti­ment. The soul shud­ders before obli­vi­on and seeks con­nec­tion at any price.”
— Hjalmar Söderberg (1869−1941), Swedish author

If a cir­cus attracts bad pub­li­city, plenty of people will still be curi­ous to learn what all the fuss is about. If they’re going to dis­like some­thing, why not get some “scan­dal­ous” first-hand gos­sip them­selves first? For the cir­cus, it beats being unknown and get­ting zero tick­ets sold.

Learnings from the “Prince of Humbugs”

P.T. Barnum, often hailed as the “Prince of Humbugs,” played a crit­ic­al role in devel­op­ing the mod­ern cir­cus. However, his life and career exten­ded bey­ond the cir­cus tent and provided numer­ous les­sons per­tin­ent to the busi­ness landscape. 

The fol­low­ing are some of the most sig­ni­fic­ant learn­ings from Barnum, viewed through the lens of con­tem­por­ary man­age­ment and lead­er­ship practices:

Though drawn from a markedly dif­fer­ent era and industry, these learn­ings from P.T. Barnum remain sur­pris­ingly applic­able to mod­ern businesses.

No such thing as bad pub­li­city? Well, it’s com­plic­ated. But as for gen­er­at­ing “bad pub­li­city” on pur­pose, I’d sug­gest leav­ing any such advanced (and highly volat­ile!) PR strategies to professionals.

PR Resource: Notable PR Contributors

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Notable PR Contributors

• Edward Bernays — The Father of PR
• Ivy Lee and the First Press Release
• P.T. Barnum: “There’s No Such Thing as Bad Publicity”
• Walter Lippmann: Public Opinion and Perception Management
• John Dewey and the ‘P’ in Public Relations
• Marshall McLuhan: “The Medium is the Message”
• Leon Festinger — The Psychologist Behind Cognitive Dissonance
• Shep Gordon: “Make Parents Angry”

It’s noted that the gender bias is appar­ent here. I’m cur­rently research­ing a more bal­anced list.

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PR Resource: The Amplification Hypothesis

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The Amplification Hypothesis

It’s com­mon to find that coun­ter­ar­gu­ments strengthen exist­ing beliefs instead of weak­en­ing them. 

• The harder you attack someone verbally, the more you con­vince them of their belief, not yours.

The phe­nomen­on is known as the amp­li­fic­a­tion hypo­thes­is, where dis­play­ing cer­tainty about an atti­tude when talk­ing with anoth­er per­son increases and hardens that attitude.

“Across exper­i­ments, it is demon­strated that increas­ing atti­tude cer­tainty strengthens atti­tudes (e.g., increases their res­ist­ance to per­sua­sion) when atti­tudes are uni­valent but weak­ens atti­tudes (e.g., decreases their res­ist­ance to per­sua­sion) when atti­tudes are ambi­val­ent. These res­ults are con­sist­ent with the amp­li­fic­a­tion hypo­thes­is.“
Source: Journal of Personality and Social Psychology ³Clarkson, J. J., Tormala, Z. L., & Rucker, D. D. (2008). A new look at the con­sequences of atti­tude cer­tainty: The amp­li­fic­a­tion hypo­thes­is. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, … Continue read­ing

How does the amp­li­fic­a­tion hypo­thes­is work? 

In a threat­en­ing situ­ation or emer­gency, we resort to the prim­al (fast­est) part of the brain and sur­viv­al instincts (fight, flight and freeze). ⁴Surviving the Storm: Understanding the Nature of Attacks held at Animal Care Expo, 2011 in Orlando, FL.

• Dichotomous think­ing. This think­ing style is at the heart of rad­ic­al move­ments and fun­da­ment­al­ism. Even people who exer­cise abstract think­ing, logic, reas­on, and the abil­ity to recog­nize com­plex issues can resort to this think­ing style when threatened. ⁵Silfwer, J. (2017, June 13). Conversion Theory — Disproportionate Minority Influence. Doctor Spin | The PR Blog. https://​doc​tor​spin​.net/​c​o​n​v​e​r​s​i​o​n​-​t​h​e​o​ry/
• Egocentric think­ing. People who demon­strate non-ego­centric think­ing in many areas can also use this think­ing style under stress. When a tar­get is labelled an enemy, cog­nit­ive steps jus­ti­fy viol­ent beha­viour and pre­vent altru­ism and empathy. ⁶Beck (1999): Homogenization, Dehumanization and Demonization.
• Distorted think­ing. We tend to ignore details in our envir­on­ments that do not sup­port our think­ing and beliefs. ⁷Cognitive dis­son­ance. (2023, November 20). In Wikipedia. https://​en​.wiki​pe​dia​.org/​w​i​k​i​/​C​o​g​n​i​t​i​v​e​_​d​i​s​s​o​n​a​nce

Establishing com­mon ground and exhib­it­ing empathy demon­strates a genu­ine under­stand­ing of their per­spect­ive, fos­ter­ing trust and open­ness to your ideas. Conversely, a stra­tegic mis­match of atti­tudes can serve as a power­ful coun­ter­meas­ure if your object­ive is to deflect per­suas­ive attempts.

Persuade

To per­suade, align your atti­tude with the tar­get. Otherwise, you will only act to cre­ate resistance.

Provoke

To put off a per­suader, mis­match their atti­tudes. When they are logic­al, be emo­tion­al, and vice versa. 

Learn more: The Amplification Hypothesis: How To Counter Extreme Positions

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PR Resource: The Anatomy of Attention

“There’s only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.”
— Oscar Wilde

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The Anatomy of Attention

Attention is an essen­tial com­pon­ent of pub­lic relations:

• An organ­isa­tion, starved of atten­tion, trust, and loy­alty, is com­pelled to wage a per­petu­al struggle for its con­tin­ued existence.

And it’s not just organ­isa­tions. We all seem to crave atten­tion in some form or another:

“People want to be loved; fail­ing that admired; fail­ing that feared; fail­ing that hated and des­pised. They want to evoke some sort of sen­ti­ment. The soul shud­ders before obli­vi­on and seeks con­nec­tion at any price.”
— Hjalmar Söderberg (1869−1941), Swedish author

It’s fear of social isol­a­tion— and atten­tion star­va­tion.

But what con­sti­tutes ‘atten­tion’?

“Attention is a com­plex, real neur­al archi­tec­ture (‘RNA’) mod­el that integ­rates vari­ous cog­nit­ive mod­els and brain cen­ters to per­form tasks like visu­al search.”
Source: Trends in cog­nit­ive sci­ences ⁸Shipp, S. (2004). The brain cir­cuitry of atten­tion. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 8, 223 – 230. https://​doi​.org/​1​0​.​1​0​1​6​/​j​.​t​i​c​s​.​2​0​0​4​.​0​3​.​004

Each of the below terms refers to a spe­cif­ic aspect or type of atten­tion (“men­tal band­width”), a com­plex cog­nit­ive pro­cess. ⁹Schweizer, K., Moosbrugger, H., & Goldhammer, F. (2005). The struc­ture of the rela­tion­ship between atten­tion and intel­li­gence. Intelligence, 33(6), 589 – 611. … Continue read­ing

Let’s explore dif­fer­ent types of attention:

• Alertness. This is the state of being watch­ful and ready to respond. It’s the most basic form of atten­tion, rep­res­ent­ing our read­i­ness to per­ceive and pro­cess inform­a­tion from the environment.
• Sustained atten­tion. This involves focus­ing on a spe­cif­ic task or stim­u­lus over a pro­longed peri­od. It’s cru­cial for tasks that require ongo­ing con­cen­tra­tion, like read­ing or driving.
• Focused atten­tion. This refers to the abil­ity to con­cen­trate on one par­tic­u­lar stim­u­lus or task while ignor­ing oth­ers. It’s the abil­ity to focus nar­rowly on a single thing.
• Attentional switch­ing. Also known as task switch­ing or cog­nit­ive flex­ib­il­ity, this involves shift­ing focus from one task to anoth­er. It’s crit­ic­al for mul­ti­task­ing and adapt­ing to chan­ging demands or priorities.
• Divided atten­tion. This is the abil­ity to pro­cess two or more responses or react to mul­tiple tasks sim­ul­tan­eously. It’s often tested by ask­ing people to per­form two tasks sim­ul­tan­eously, like listen­ing to a con­ver­sa­tion while writing.
• Attention accord­ing to the super­vis­ory atten­tion­al sys­tem. This concept, derived from cog­nit­ive psy­cho­logy, refers to a high­er-level con­trol sys­tem that reg­u­lates the alloc­a­tion of atten­tion, par­tic­u­larly in situ­ations requir­ing plan­ning or decision-making.
• Attention as inhib­i­tion. This aspect of atten­tion involves sup­press­ing irrel­ev­ant or dis­tract­ing stim­uli. It’s a cru­cial com­pon­ent of focused atten­tion and self-regulation.
• Spatial atten­tion. This type of atten­tion focuses on a spe­cif­ic area with­in the visu­al field. It’s like a spot­light that enhances inform­a­tion pro­cessing in a par­tic­u­lar location.
• Attention as plan­ning. This per­spect­ive views atten­tion as a resource that needs to be alloc­ated effi­ciently, espe­cially in com­plex tasks requir­ing stra­tegic plan­ning and organization.
• Interference. In the con­text of atten­tion, inter­fer­ence refers to the pro­cess by which irrel­ev­ant inform­a­tion or dis­trac­tions impede the effi­ciency of cog­nit­ive processing.
• Attention as arous­al. This con­siders atten­tion in the con­text of the gen­er­al level of alert­ness or arous­al. It’s about the read­i­ness of the brain to engage with stim­uli or tasks.
• Attention accord­ing to the assess­ment tra­di­tion. This refers to meas­ur­ing and eval­u­at­ing atten­tion­al pro­cesses, often in clin­ic­al or edu­ca­tion­al set­tings, to identi­fy atten­tion defi­cits or disorders.

Each type of atten­tion plays a cru­cial role in how we inter­act with and pro­cess inform­a­tion from our envir­on­ment, and under­stand­ing these dif­fer­ent aspects is key in fields like psy­cho­logy, neur­os­cience, and education.

Learn more: The Anatomy of Attention

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PR Resource: A Glass of Many Truths

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A Glass of Many Truths

Let’s say that there’s a glass of water stand­ing on a table in front of you — and there’s water in it. The glass holds 100 ml of water but could store 200 ml if filled up.

I could say that the glass is half full. That’s true.

I could also say that the glass is half empty. Still true.

Both state­ments are equally val­id, of course, but the choice of words will influ­ence our ste­reo­typ­ic­al think­ing about the state of the glass and its content. 

The second state­ment emphas­ises empti­ness (the glass needs a refill), and the first state­ment is full­ness (the glass needs no refill).

Now, let’s get even more creative:

The glass is full. True, yes?

Technically, this state­ment is true as well:

50% of the glass con­tains water; the oth­er 50% is split between roughly 78% nitro­gen, 21% oxy­gen, argon, car­bon diox­ide, and small amounts of oth­er gasses. 

How about this:

The glass is not half full, nor is it half empty. Also true.

An equal split between water and gasses implies an exact divi­sion of pro­tons, neut­rons, and elec­trons. But Heisenberg’s uncer­tainty prin­ciple says no.

Such accur­acy might not mat­ter to you or me, but for a phys­i­cist, these pre­cise ver­sions of the truth might make all the difference.

So, what does a glass of water have to do with PR?

• In a demo­cracy, com­pet­ing interests will put for­ward the truths that best serve their pur­poses. If you care about your interests, you should spin for the win, too.

Learn more: Does Spin Suck?

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