Ayala Land, Meralco, Sulpicio Lines, ABS-CBN - what they have in common

yes, we have to admit it, that list of companies is a very strange one. the first reaction is probably this - no way is there something common among all those companies.

well, there is one - crisis. actually there are two - crisis management is the other one. all the companies listed above has gone through some kind of crisis. different ones but a crisis just the same. of interest to us is also the kind of crisis management practices they applied when crisis hit their companies.

ayala land got hit by the explosion in the their most important property, the glorietta mall. nobody imagined that such an explosion can occur in a mall and this is not just an ordinary mall, it's an ayala mall. over the years, ayala malls have built a very strong reputation of high quality and invincibility. the explosion also occurred at a time when there was some political noise in the country that most people concluded this was a terrorist attack.


the explosion happened on a work day and within a very short period of time the press was on site with live cameras and even helicopter aerial shots of the damage to the mall.

ayala land's crisis management response was impeccable - within minutes of the explosion, they had an officer of the company, most probably from their public relations group, in the site talking to the press. of course the ayala land spokesman had no information to share since the explosion just occurred minutes ago, but the important thing was an officer of the company was actually on site and giving the views of the management of the mall. he talked to the press in a very calm and professional manner and was very candid in admitting he did not have of details about what happened. he was also re-assuring the public and the press that ayala management is concerned and is on top of things. ayala land was not hiding, they were actually on site and being very involved.

immediacy and visibility is one of the most important good practices of crisis management.




more on this in WAWAM!.....

judy ann santos meralco system loss tv commercial

news report say the judy ann santos system loss tv spot was filmed a day before she left for europe. that was what i thought, it was a quick produce tv spot, probably done in her home using an HD camera.

the copywriting is fine, the ice melting analogy to explain system loss is great but the production values showed it was a rush job. the lighting was ok but it was not very professional. more importantly, and this i think is key is judy ann santos was not engaging, she did not elicit sympathy. i think the director gave judy ann santos the wrong directions. the director most likely told judy ann to deliver the lines and look that way because it was a "serious" topic. and that's how judy ann delivered her lines - a straightforward delivery.

but that kind of delivery took away the charm of judy ann santos. she is a tv and movie superstar, she caters to millions of her fans and we don't like to see her as a serious actress when we see her in things other than in her mivies. we all know she is not an engineer, nor an academe nor an economist, the ad agency got her for her popularity as a movie and tv superstar. and we like to see judy ann as warm, amiable and engaging. that's how we want to see her.

this directorial treatment was a bad call for the director.




the controversy over the tv ad rages on. i like the print ad released by meralco where it said the issue is not judy ann santos, the issue is "system loss".

that is precisely correct.


they probably felt the need to release that print ad because of the way pro-administration defenders have been coming out lashing on judy ann santos herself. judy ann is just a commercial talent that was paid to do a job. any talent, known or unknown could have appeared in that commercial and it could have communicated the same things it is doing now.

the pro-administration defenders have been lashing out on judy ann santos herself, taking it too personal which is highly unwarranted.

i suppose this over-reaction and personal attacks on the commercial talent is a tribute to the impact and power of the ad.

caught in the political storm

i agree that garcia and the government were most likely caught flat footed with the juday system loss tv ad. that is very obvious in the way they reacted to the airing of the ad. you see a frenzy of scare tactics, doomsday pronouncements and all types of ridiculous assertions on what the ad was saying, or what it was trying to do and what sins the ad committed. panic time talaga!
that shows you the power of the ad.

garcia and the govt should all grow up. if the juday ad did them some, what's to prevent them from doing an ad themselves?

juday "system loss" tv spot produced by first philippine holdings company

the judy ann santos commercial explaining "system loss" was produced and paid for by first philippine holdings corporation, with the lopezes as majority owners and a major stockholder in meralco.

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Lopez firm defends system loss commercial

The sponsor of the controversial system loss commercial explaining the principle of system loss which starred local actress Judy Ann Santos, defended the commercial saying that it only wants to simplify a very technical term.

Early this week, a number of critics bashed the commercial, in which Ms. Santos explained system loss by comparing it to a bag of melting ice, saying that it misleads people.
In a statement, Lopez-owned First Philippine Holdings Corp. (FPHC) clarified that it - not the Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) — had paid for the advertisement.

"As a major shareholder of Meralco, we are very concerned with the inaccurate information being circulated in the media. Certain groups are using technical concepts and complicated issues to manipulate public opinion, discredit Meralco or the Lopez Group." FPHC’s statement said.

FPHC further said that the commercial only sought to explain the salient points of system loss. Legal provisions and regulations are often hard to understand but they have to be relied upon in this instance. FPHC also said that it only meant to make things simpler for the people by using the "electricity-melting ice" analogy.

"There is no intent to deceive or confuse but simply an effort to clarify, within the constraints of the broadcast medium."

Further, it stressed that Ms. Santos was not misled into doing the advertisement.
"In our desire to bring accurate information to Meralco’s four million customers, we asked Ms. Santos to assist us in our information drive. Ms. Santos believed in the message we wanted to communicate, she was not forced or misled to do the advertisement," FPHC noted.

This as Manila Rep. Bienvenido M. Abante, Jr. (6th district) said he will look at the possibility that Ms. Santos violated the Consumers Protection Act when she appeared in the controversial advertisement.

He further said that local celebrities should choose their endorsements wisely especially if they concern the public’s welfare.

Yesterday, Executive Secretary Eduardo R. Ermita said that the palace did not mind Meralco’s decision to use Ms. Santos to explain the systems losses it charges to its consumers and was not surprised by Meralco’s move to rebuild its image with its consumers.

"That is an effort to justify their position. However, the viewers will still decide to believe [them or not]." — Ava Kashima K. Austria

http://www.bworldonline.com/BW060708/content.php?id=042

judy ann santos' meralco system loss tv spot

there is nothing earth shaking about the judy ann santos "system loss" tv ad for meralco from an advertising stand point. it's a run of the mill, quick produce tv commercial like most of the ads we see on tv. it won't win any advertising award anytime soon or later.

the commercial itself, copywriting, concept and production values are unremarkable but the marketing and communication strategy or thinking behind it is brilliant.

here is a background snap shot : there is an on-going media war between the government and winston garcia versus meralco on supposedly the fight for the lowering of power rates in the country, which happens to be the second most expensive in asia.

it first started as a media war, but it became a real world corporate battle when garcia, doing a 180 degree turn from previous announcements that he does not intend to take over meralco actually attempted a hostile take-over of meralco during the annual stockholders meeting that meralco had a few weeks ago. garcia came to the meeting armed not with plans and intelligent arguments but with an infirmed SEC order preventing the counting of the proxy votes casted in favor of the majority stockholders but was thwarted by brilliant lawyering on the part of the meralco legal team. of course it did not stop there, the media war continues to this day.

at the heart of the issue is the so called "system loss" where meralco passes on to consumers the losses they incur in transmitting the power from the meralco source to the individual residential and commercial users. system loss is not unique to meralco nor to the power industry. it is a global and national practice among power disrtributors. even other manufacturing businesses pass their own version of system loss to consumers. also by law, meralco is allowed to pass a system loss equivalent to 9.5% to its customers.

the juday tv spot is a brilliant marketing and communication move because it dramatically tips the scale in favor meralco through a totally unexpected means. i think the juday tv spot caught winston garcia and the government flat footed. i don't think winston garcia and the government were able to anticipate or even imagine meralco will launch such a media attack through a tv spot featuring juday.

before the juday tv spot, the media war or the battle for winning public opinion was waged through countless press releases, daily press and tv interviews and full page print ads from both camps. the juday tv spot was a refreshing take and totally out of the box but powerful.

first, this is probably the first time in the history of philippine advertising where a national issue that had political and economic implications was explained to the public through a tv spot during a non-election year. political ads we have had before cannot be compared to the juday spot, the political ads were meant to sell the candidates, the juday tv spot is meant to explain to the public some very technical component of the electric bills we all pay.



the use of juday is also a brilliant move and very pinoy. in other countries, topics of this sort would have have featured compelling visuals to illustrate the point or experts in the field like well known engineers, economists or professors doing the talking in the ad. but, we are in the philippines, right? philippine heroes or figures of authority do not come from such esoteric fields, they come from the interview set of boy abunda's The Buzz!

juday reeks of masa! and i mean that as a compliment for the ad agency who chose her. i am guessing that system loss is difficult to understand for most consumers. the use of the block of ice melting while on transit from plant to consumer is also a brilliant creative idea. it simplifies and eloquently communicates what system loss, down to the lowest level or median level of the consumer mind. a simple idea or explanation delivered by a simple woman, juday, admired by simple folks. brilliant!

more than the choice of juday and the use of the melting block of ice mnemonic device in the ad, what trumps these two brilliant components of the effort is the brilliant marketing and communications strategic move of winning the battle for public opinion through a tv spot over and beyond the press releases and interviews.

this effort puts meralco on the driver seat in this battle for public opinion. meralco is now defining the issues and doing it very well. winston garcia and the govt needs to play catch up now.

not only is this ad historic for the philippine advertising industry, it can be historic for the whole country in the way battles are waged to win public opinion.