Creating Aflac duck merchandise enabled the insurance company to donate significan funds to their primary philanthropic cause: childhood cancer. In all, Aflac has donated more than $65 million for childhood cancer since 1995. The Aflac duck is thought to have a "life of its own outside Aflac itself," making the spot in the hall of fame extremely well-deserved.
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Aflac Duck Waddles Into PR News Public Relations Hall of Fame
Aflac, the number one provider of guaranteed renewable insurance, announced today that their icon, the Aflac duck, has been added to the Platinum PR Hall of Fame. The Aflac duck was recognized as making a big impact on the public relations industry. Aflac executives comment that the duck has a mass appeal and made the company extremely recognizable which has enabled them to use more Social Media to reach out to the public.
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4 comments:
I have never liked the duck. Didn't know there was a PR Hall of Fame.
This is really surprising to me because the Aflac Duck commercial is one of the most obnoxious commercials ever! I can see how it would give the company recognition, but not in a good way!
The Aflac team has used the duck to produce a lot of great PR. As most of you know, the company fired Gilbert Gottfried as the voice of the duck after he made inappropriate jokes on his Twitter account. After that, Aflac turned the tragedy into an opportunity by hosting a contest to find the next voice of the duck.
More info on that here:
http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/22/aflac-and-monster-team-up-to-find-a-ducks-voice/
I didn't realize that Gilbert was the voice of the duck. Crazy! And that whole scandal...
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