Ah, April Fools’ Day. The one day of the year companies can promote completely fake information and not be blasted off the face of the Internet.
It’s a can’t-miss recipe for entertainment. And though some April Fools pranks may fall flat, many strike just the right chord with the public. And media outlets, for their part, lap it up.
Brands (and their PR, comms and marketing squads), as well, love the free exposure and buzz generated when an April Fools campaign clicks.
Which is why we used MediaMiser software to analyze the media traction of some of the top April Fools’ Day pranks of 2015, as defined by Mashable’s “ultimate” April Fools’ pranks roundup.
As the chart plainly shows, Google’s marketing folks scored a major PR coup yesterday: the company’s April Fools pranks took four out of the top ten spots in terms of online news share of voice.
Its Google Maps Pac Man, backwards website (com.google) and Google Fiber “Dial-Up Mode” each landed in the top ten (the Pac Man initiative, in particular, chewed up the rest of the competition). Google Inbox’s “Smart Box” picked up some significant mentions as well.
Other noteworthies included Miz Mooz “Selfie Shoes” and Redbox’s “Petbox”, a kiosk for pet entertainment.
Not to be outdone by B2C companies, CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research) also got into the act by claiming it had discovered “The Force”.
