Rebel Yell PR Strategy: Picking a Fight To Get Recognised

The Rebel Yell PR strategy is one of my favourites.

There are some brands we love a little bit more than others.

We love the brave. We love the rebels. We love the mis­fits. We love the under­dogs. We love the smart minor­ity. We love those who dare stick their neck out and risk their business. 

The rebels we cel­eb­rate man­age to come out in front of a sig­ni­fic­ant shift in our soci­et­al value sys­tem. Yes, it’s a ques­tion about tim­ing — and a bit of pub­li­city momentum.

Here we go:

Controversy as a PR Strategy

Sparking con­tro­versy as a PR strategy is often frowned upon. It’s seen as a cheap trick to attract attention. 

Still, brands can reap sig­ni­fic­ant bene­fits; con­tro­versy cre­ates a rift in pub­lic opin­ion between them and us. 

Rock and roll were con­sidered dev­il music by the late major­ity for quite some time. Unethical, even. It was push­ing the bound­ar­ies of what was socially accept­able. More import­antly, rock and roll is still around today.

After all — Elvis Presley was a rebel.

If being con­tro­ver­sial is a power­ful PR strategy, what’s the catch? Because there must be a catch, right?

In 1928 George Washington Hill, the pres­id­ent of the American Tobacco Company, hired Edward Bernays, today known as the fath­er of pub­lic rela­tions, to help him recruit women smokers. 

The Champion of … Big Tobacco?

As a way of dis­play­ing a bur­geon­ing move­ment of women’s rights in the US, female celebrit­ies and influ­en­cers star­ted smoking cigar­ettes out in the open as a sign of eman­cip­a­tion since smoking cigar­ettes in pub­lic was some­thing only “fallen” women did.

Bernays hired women to march while smoking their “torches of free­dom” in the Easter Sunday Parade of 1929, a march tra­di­tion­ally well-covered by the media. Of course, this con­tro­versy sparked lots of pub­li­city for the cause.

The cam­paign helped push the women’s move­ment for­ward.
That’s good.

But it also per­suaded more people to take up smoking.
That isn’t … good.

A Delicate (But Deliberate) Balancing Act

Don’t get me wrong. Someone might think that smoking is good or that grown-ups should be allowed to decide what’s best for them­selves. I respect that. 

But the crit­ic­al point here is that it’s pos­sible to spark con­tro­versy for controversy’s sake. It’s pos­sible to scare people sense­less. It’s pos­sible to shock or gross people like American Apparel, who face lots of pub­lic out­rage for their sex­ist ads. 

Still, American Apparel is piss­ing some people off. Not every­one. And that’s the key to a suc­cess­ful strategy based on con­tro­versy. The notori­ous tal­ent man­ager and film agent Shep Gordon, who pulled off many con­tro­ver­sial PR stunts in his long career, summed up his wis­dom in this state­ment: ¹Shep Gordon. (2023, December 21). In Wikipedia. https://​en​.wiki​pe​dia​.org/​w​i​k​i​/​S​h​e​p​_​G​o​r​don

“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

Teenagers tend to be inter­ested in con­tro­ver­sies that get their par­ents gasp­ing for air in shock. It’s an act of rebellion.

It’s all about the amp­li­fic­a­tion hypothesis.

The Amplification Hypothesis 

The Amplification Hypothesis

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

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.

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

The Rebel Yell Statement

Pick a Fight With Someone Stronger

There are count­less mean­ing­ful rebel­lions for brands to par­ti­cip­ate in. The secret is to identi­fy a Stupid Majority and a Smart Minority.

Stupid Majority = a major­ity of today that will stead­ily decline into a minor­ity of tomorrow.

Smart Minority = a minor­ity of today that will grow into a new major­ity of tomorrow.

There’s con­sumer­ism to rebel against. Capitalism. Communism. Climate. Religion, even. Heck, you could even rebel against tech­no­logy tak­ing over our lives. Whatever.

Stupid Majority + Smart Minority = PR Success

Here’s the key to using con­tro­versy as a power­ful strategy:

You become a rebel by pick­ing a fight with someone stronger than you to cre­ate your desired future. 

PR Resource: Free Strategy PR Course

PR Resource: The Stupid Majority

The Stupid Majority

From what the Conversion Theory teaches us, minor­it­ies tend to hold their opin­ions more firmly. This is reas­on­able since going against the major­ity comes at a high­er social cost. ⁸Silfwer, 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/

But some minor­it­ies have an addi­tion­al advantage:

Smart Minority = a minor­ity of today that will grow into a new major­ity of tomorrow.

In con­trast, some major­it­ies have an addi­tion­al disadvantage:

Stupid Majority = a major­ity of today that will stead­ily decline into a minor­ity of tomorrow.

Identifying a Stupid Majority (and sid­ing with a Smart Minority) will cla­ri­fy your core mes­sage and attract highly engaged minor­ity supporters.

Examples of Stupid Majorities

Stupid Majorities are to be found everywhere:

What’s a Stupid Majority in your industry?

Read also: The Stupid Majority PR Strategy: How Underdogs Dominate

PR Resource: Edward Bernays

The Father of PR: Edward Bernays

Edward Bernays (1891 – 1995) is con­sidered the fath­er of pub­lic rela­tions (PR). His uncle was the fam­ous psy­cho­lo­gist Sigmund Freud, and Bernays, too, was inter­ested in beha­vi­our­al psy­cho­logy. ⁹Edward Bernays. (2023, November 13). In Wikipedia. https://​en​.wiki​pe​dia​.org/​w​i​k​i​/​E​d​w​a​r​d​_​B​e​r​n​ays ¹⁰Olasky, M. (1984). Retrospective: Bernays’ doc­trine of pub­lic opin­ion. Public Relations Review, 10, 3 – 12. https://​doi​.org/​1​0​.​1​0​1​6​/​S​0​3​6​3​-​8​1​1​1​(​8​4​)​8​0​088 – 0

Edward Bernays’ wife, Doris Fleischmann, was also a PR con­sult­ant who sig­ni­fic­antly con­trib­uted to the PR industry.

Bernays cer­tainly was some­thing of a char­ac­ter: His most fam­ous book is titled “Propaganda” — in which he out­lined how to man­age the per­cep­tions of crowds, much like mod­ern Niccolo Machiavelli or Sun Tzu. ¹¹Propaganda. (2023, November 10). In Wikipedia. https://​en​.wiki​pe​dia​.org/​w​i​k​i​/​P​r​o​p​a​g​a​n​d​a​_​(​b​ook)

“The con­scious and intel­li­gent manip­u­la­tion of the organ­ised habits and opin­ions of the masses is an import­ant ele­ment in demo­crat­ic soci­ety. Those who manip­u­late this unseen mech­an­ism of soci­ety con­sti­tute an invis­ible gov­ern­ment which is the true rul­ing power of our coun­try.”
Source: Propaganda ¹²Bernays, E. L. (1928). Propaganda. New York, NY: Horace Liveright.

PR Case Study: Torches of Freedom

When help­ing Lucky Strike, Bernays real­ised that cigar­ette smoking was mostly a male habit. From a busi­ness per­spect­ive, there was a golden oppor­tun­ity to add half the pop­u­la­tion to Lucky Strike’s list of poten­tial customers. 

No one had done this suc­cess­fully, not because no one ever had that idea, but because it was a tough nut to crack. But Edward Bernays suc­ceeded by tap­ping into anoth­er pre­vail­ing trend in soci­ety: The eman­cip­a­tion of women. 

Bernays posi­tioned cigar­ettes for women as “Torches of Freedom.” He placed the idea in art­icles, news­pa­pers, celebrity endorse­ments, and events. He planted the pub­lic per­cep­tion of women smoking not because it was enjoy­able but as a sym­bol of female independence.

PR Case Study: Eggs and Bacon

Have you ever had eggs and bacon for break­fast at a hotel? Well, you can thank Bernays for that idea.

Another PR legend is how Bernays helped the farm­ing industry con­vince people to eat more eggs and bacon. To do this, he wanted to change people’s per­cep­tions of when it’s okay to eat eggs and bacon.

Bernays cooper­ated with food sci­ent­ists to estab­lish that eggs and bacon should be part of a healthy break­fast for every American. And to mani­fest this, he col­lab­or­ated with chains of hotels to have them serve eggs and bacon for break­fast. ¹³Later in life, Bernays became a veget­ari­an and advoc­ated for a meat­less diet, which was unusu­al at the time, espe­cially giv­en his work pro­mot­ing products like bacon.

Learn more: Edward Bernays — The Father of PR