Member Avatar for MktgRob

It has become a popular activity for professional athletes to tweet during games from the locker room. This has created mini-communities of fans of both teams and players. But recently the NFL has banned players from Tweeting during games on the sideline. Chad OchoCinco of the Bengals has announced that he has found a loophole and he plans on flying one luck twitter follower to each of his games and that fan's job it seems, will be to keep his eyes on Chad who will use a series of hand signals to pass on the message that the fan will tweet on his behalf. Brilliant publicity stunt that could work out well for Chad, the Bengals and even the NFL.

Would you consider some audacious act like this if it could bring you a lot of attention and followers? What if there was a 50-50 chance it could blow up in your face?

For the record, I would.

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This thread frames a familiar marketing dilemma: a high-profile stunt can deliver big awareness or big trouble. is willing to take that chance; rightly warns about negative fallout. Below is a compact, practical framework for deciding whether to run a risky activation and for protecting the brand if it goes live.

  • Clarify the objective and success/failure thresholds. Be specific: number of net followers, engagement rate lift, earned media reach, or direct conversions. Decide in advance what outcome justifies the risk.
  • Do a compliance and liability sweep. Verify contracts, platform rules, intellectual property, and whether any participants need waivers or disclosure. If money or perks are exchanged, follow applicable endorsement/advertising rules.
  • Model failure scenarios and set stop-losses. List plausible things that could go wrong, estimate impact, and assign clear authority to pause or cancel the activity.
  • Pilot and rehearse. Try the concept at smaller scale, run a full script with spokespeople, and stress-test the channel and message for misunderstandings.
  • Plan amplification and measurement. Preload owned channels, line up partners, and choose tracking metrics (followers, engagement, sentiment, earned media reach, CPA).

Operational tips: script concise on-message lines and a short apology/clarification template in advance; secure written consent for any third-party participation or content use; ensure physical safety for anyone involved; buy event or liability insurance when appropriate; and have a social listening dashboard ready to detect issues fast.

After-action: compare results to baseline, calculate ROI versus the risk budget, and do a 48–72 hour post-mortem to capture learnings. If brand reputation is core, prefer controlled activations that generate buzz without dangling large downside.

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Member Avatar for mejohn

Publicity is one of those things that can go either way if it is negative. Lots of people just crave the attention.

Member Avatar for MktgRob

Publicity is one of those things that can go either way if it is negative. Lots of people just crave the attention.

Agreed, but if you had an idea that you thought could work in your favor but had an equal chance of failing would you do it? I think that what Chad OchoCinco is doing will ultimately be a win for the NFL even though they are trying to stop him from tweeting.

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