Brendan Hodgson

Everyday, innovative campaigns and tactics emerge from all sides of virtually every issue. At the same time, it’s encouraging to see corporations increasing their level of experimentation in the digital space around the areas of reputation management.

Here’s just a few recent examples of highly visible campaigns designed to both challenge and reinforce the reputations of leading corporations:

• Few organizations understand how to trigger a response better than PETA… and their latest MTV-style video campaign is no exception. The campaign - including the site itself - is reminiscent of the recent spate of cinematic gorefests - think the Hostel or Saw series - and, as such, primed for the youth segment that it’s attempting to reach. It reinforces the importance of the “extraordinary” idea (and the power of video) to be heard above the ”noise”, while also effectively demonstrating - as any activist campaign should - how to bridge seamlessly between entertainment, education, and engagement.
• On the other side, Southwest Airlines has recently taken their already impressive ”Nuts About Southwest” social media campaign up a notch and added a slew of new features - including a Flickr group, video blog, and links to their Twitter feed and Facebook group - to further connect with their massive community of fans and advocates (and to directly address emerging issues as they’ve done with their blog in recent months). 
• Lastly, in the footsteps of Ideastorm and MyStarbucksidea, American Express has launched Cardmembers Voice as a way to solicit ideas on how to improve their products and services, and to strengthen their engagement with cardholders. [update: Amex is an H&K Canada client]

More to follow in the weeks ahead.