Archive for October, 2022

"Might be the greatest promotion on Earth" – Twitter erupts after Bloodline member takes a shot at Andrew Tate on WWE SmackDown premiere -…

Fans on Twitter went into a frenzy as Paul Heyman referenced Andrew Tate, Jordan Peterson, and Ben Shapiro during a face-off between Logan Paul and The Bloodline.

On this week's WWE SmackDown premiere, The Bloodline took to the ring to address the fans in attendance. However, before Roman Reigns could proceed with his promo, Logan Paul, Reigns' opponent at Crown Jewel, stepped up to the ring. Paul Heyman then cut a promo on Paul and the pop industry, referencing Tate, Peterson, and Shapiro in the process.

In reaction to Heyman namedropping Tate on live television, fans went wild on Twitter. The majority of them praised the veteran manager for taking shots at Tate, while some even questioned if Tate was going to face Roman Reigns down the road.

Check out the Twitter reactions below:

Throughout 2022, Tate gained massive popularity on social media. He is a former kickboxer whose comments in recent months have led to him getting banned on multiple social media platforms such as Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook.

At the upcoming WWE Crown Jewel show in Saudi Arabia, Roman Reigns will defend his Undisputed WWE Universal Championship against Logan Paul. He will aim to get a big win for The Bloodline.

The Tribal Chief will put his title on the line against the YouTube megastar, who will be competing in only his third match with the promotion. Reigns and Paul previously sat down for an interview on the IMPAULSIVE podcast, which marked the beginning of their ongoing rivalry.

The Maverick almost caused a riff among The Bloodline on the latest episode of SmackDown when he followed Heyman's promo by asking who The Tribal Chief was, Roman Reigns or Jey Uso? The situation was handled by Sami Zayn, who reiterated that the faction needs to be on the same page.

Could Andrew Tate be the next social media influencer after Logan Paul to appear in WWE? Sound off in the comments section below.

Did a respected WWE Hall of Famer predict a major title switch at Extreme Rules right here?

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"Might be the greatest promotion on Earth" - Twitter erupts after Bloodline member takes a shot at Andrew Tate on WWE SmackDown premiere -...

Quiet, everyone! Megyn Kelly has thoughts about Jordan Peterson and Super Bowl vaginas! – The Independent

Megyn No-Stranger-to-Controversy Kelly has done it again this week. The firebrand TV and podcast host, in a bizarre blast from the past, bashed Latina superstars J-Lo and Shakira for their revealing outfits and sexy performance during the (wait for it) 2020 Super Bowl halftime show. And we thought only Trump was still fixated on 2020!

Some complained at the time that the Super Bowl show was inappropriate for the legions of children who no doubt had been watching the game. Never mind that this particular, long-ago Super Bowl featured several other disturbing sights, including Jason Momoa taking a bubble bath (in a commercial for Rocket Mortgage) and a horrifying ad for Planters peanuts in which the beloved Mr Peanut drops from a cliff to a fiery death. Not to mention the ultra-violent spectacle of pro football itself.

No, what seemed for Kelly and others as a bridge too far was the musical number featuring two beautiful, talented women of a certain age having a blast onstage (though Kelly insisted that their vag were visible, they were not). Oddly, Kelly also referred in the same segment to a recent Paulina Porizkova photoshoot, where the 57-year-old Czech model can be seen almost nude, as amazing. Guess it depends on whose bottom is showing.

Kelly also dipped a toe into the whirlpool of commentary surrounding Olivia Wildes new film Dont Worry Darling, with a full-throated defense of the Canadian pop psychologist Jordan Peterson. Peterson was the inspiration for the villainous character played by Chris Pine. Wilde called him a hero to the incel community, which she described as young men who feel they have been marginalized, and sexually deprived, by powerful, confident women.

Peterson thinks transgender rights somehow invalidate his own, denies the concept of white privilege, and says that men who do not intend to sexually harass women shouldnt be prosecuted for doing so. Megyn Kellys thoughts on the matter are: [Petersons] been one of the few people speaking to young men [about] whats been bothering them over the last few years, while she had this to say specifically of Wilde: Screw her!

Megyn Kelly is certainly entitled to her opinions, but some of those opinions need to be (and have been) called out. A few other examples of Kelly comments include: The Black community has a thug mentality and a culture of victimhood. Theres nothing wrong with white people dressing up in blackface. Santa and Jesus are white. (Note: while it did not save her career at NBC, Kelly did eventually offer apologies for the blackface remarks. Santa and Jesus are still waiting for theirs).

In a world where too many suffer from what could be called Selective Outrage Syndrome (Im only upset when my biases are called into question), we should hold Megyn Kelly and other prominent people to a higher standard. It has never been more important to consider the impact of our remarks and writings in this very polarized society.

But its unlikely that folks like Kelly will stop stoking controversy (which, after all, helps ratings). Its much likelier that well be hearing, and reading, even wilder pronouncements in the very near future.

If current events dont spark anything, Megyn what do you say about that Madonna-Britney Spears kiss at the 2003 VMA awards?

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Quiet, everyone! Megyn Kelly has thoughts about Jordan Peterson and Super Bowl vaginas! - The Independent

Why online lit platform Wattpad is keying its organic digital strategy on TikTok videos – Digiday

Online literature platform Wattpad is holding onto its ad dollars, leveraging organic growth on social media and prioritizing its owned channels to build up community engagement by way of exclusive interviews and comedic TikTok videos.

Theres all this engagement already happening on Wattpad, said Abby Yew, Wattpads head of marketing.We havent focused on growth at all.

Wattpad is an online literature platform, founded in 2006, on which users can create and publish written content. According to the brand, about 90 million people use the platform, five million of whom are Wattpad writers. Wattpad has 1.4 million TikTok followers and nearly double that on Instagram, where it has 2.2 million followers. Instead of spending big on increasingly steep CPMs in a crowded digital marketplace, Wattpad leverages a mostly organic social media strategy, tapping into existing communities like #BookTok on TikTok to boost engagement and build its online community.

When you talk about our channels, because were not focused on growth in advertising and paid media, were really utilizing and leveraging our own channels, Yew said.

For example, a TikTok book influencer will organically recommend a story written by a Wattpad creator. To capitalize on that movement, Wattpads social team joins the conversation, reacting in real time, according to Yew. Other times, the company posts exclusive content with Wattpads more notable writers. Any paid media is reserved for retargeting purposes, but its really very low, lower funnel, focus versus anything awareness and engagement. Its all organic, Yew said.

Thats not to say the brand doesnt spend on digital media at all. So far this year, Wattpad has spent at least $250,000 on paid digital media, according to Pathmatics. That figure is significantly higher than last years spend, which was just $46,900. Per Kantar, the brand spent just shy of $700,000 on media this year. (Kantar figures do not include social and digital spend as Pathmatics figures do.) Last year, that spend was less than half at $255,000.

Aside from social media, Wattpad also has paid investments in desktop and mobile display, according to Pathmatics.

Wattpad isnt alone in leaning into online communities and trends like #BookTok to gain traction with users. Earlier this year, Penguin Random House inked a deal with TikTok that allowed users to link to books in videos using the hashtag, according to previous Digiday reporting.

While organic social can be a key component of any marketing plan, marketing experts say pressure mounting on social media platforms to turn a profit via ad revenue could limit organic growth in the long term.

While a feature may start free as a means of testing use cases, at some point in the future we expect to have to pay-to-play, Shalanna Clark, head of marketing at marketing agency Code3, said in an email to Digiday. While brands should look for ways to enhance their organic social presence to authentically build community, social media fickleness demands a level of paid delivery to ensure the user sees your message, let alone engages with it, said Clark.

Wattpad has dabbled with paid efforts in the past, but didnt see the return on investment. Hence, why the company is now bullish on organic marketing and building up its owned channels, per Yew.

Were so fortunate that the product is so sticky in itself and that were able to then just focus on preference, brand loyalty and getting into that conversation with our audiences, Yew said.

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Why online lit platform Wattpad is keying its organic digital strategy on TikTok videos - Digiday

Activist ESG investing the Goldilocks of responsible investing – CNBC

ESG has been an incredible movement. It has had a momentum and acceleration that was seemingly unstoppable, and for good reason. Everyone wants to save the climate and support treating employees, customers and communities with respect. Everyone is for good corporate governance.

Yet, for several years, many people, particularly behind closed doors and in private conversations, have been skeptical about investing based on environmental, social, and corporate governance factors. This skepticism to ESG investing has come to a head lately.

Why is this? It is because there is a tremendous disconnect between ESG as a philosophy and as an investment product. ESG is a conceptual idea of new factors that market participants should consider when investing in and managing corporations. Many ESG investment funds took this idea and exploited it as a marketing tool to raise assets in strategies that relied on quantitative data and ratings that were easily manipulated, and that were way too passive to create any real change. Moreover, there is a widespread perception, if not reality, that ESG investing means sacrificing returns.

Now, a bear market has exposed these weaknesses, and for the first time, the ESG investing movement has been losing some steam. Even worse, these exposed deficiencies in ESG investment funds have opened the door for funds that market themselves as the antithesis of ESG, advocating for the elimination of any social motivations to corporations and totally disregarding ethnicity and gender in hiring practices. This drastic reaction to ESG funds does on the right exactly what it is criticizing on the left: It takes an extreme position that exploits the views of the far right to weaponize the opponents of ESG funds just as many ESG funds were created to exploit and weaponize the acolytes of ESG. Ideologically maximizing profits while ignoring social repercussions will lead to companies like Purdue Pharma or boards that rationalize potential oil spills through a cost-benefit analysis of the potential fines and cleanup costs versus the costs of prevention. How about worker safety? Should that be sacrificed if the cost to keep employees safe exceeds the liability and costs to replace injured employees? Anti-ESG funds focused solely on shareholder value would presumably forego the costs and pay the liability. Moreover, does anyone other than these anti-ESG funds really believe that a board or management team is not better when it has qualified members with a diversity of perspectives and life experiences than when it is all white and male?

Of course, environmental, social and governance factors should be considered by management teams and investors, but they are factors that need to be weighed, not mandated. These decisions are more complex than either side acknowledges. They cannot be made quantitatively, with generalizations or by extremists. They need to be made qualitatively, by an active participant weighing the pros and cons and pragmatically advocating for a position that benefits all stakeholders, including shareholders. That is what active ESG investing, or AESG, does.

AESG investing is when an activist investor takes a position at a company and actively (usually from a board level) and qualitatively analyzes and improves not only financial, operational and strategic facets of the company, but also its ESG footprint. Funds like Inclusive Capital and Impactive Capital are the leaders in this area, and they look at every investment not only through a shareholder value lens, but an ESG lens as well. In many cases these funds advocate for ESG practices at their portfolio companies that advance shareholder value. Other activists, while more focused on operational, financial and strategic matters at their portfolio companies, are realizing that while they are actively involved at these companies, they are also in a unique position to improve ESG practices at the company. Accordingly, many of these funds, like Starboard, ValueAct and Third Point have dedicated ESG executives to help focus on such opportunities. We are seeing many more of them starting to adopt such practices.

These AESG investors realize that you cannot accomplish ESG objectives by investing in the "best" ESG companies and excluding the worst. Nor can you expect management teams to blindly adhere to ESG pressures regardless of the effect they will have on shareholder value. Instead, AESG investors analyze ESG issues and opportunities, as well as the company's financials and operations, to pragmatically develop strategies and practices that either advance both ESG and shareholder value or further one of them without hindering the other.

Accordingly, AESG solves the problems with ESG investing as (i) it is genuine, not a marketing ploy, (ii) it relies on qualitative analysis, not quantitative metrics and ratings, (iii) it uses engagement to actually effect ESG change without sacrificing shareholder value, and (iv) it has the alpha that has historically been associated with shareholder activism. Moreover, AESG investors are not only looking to change ESG practices at their portfolio companies during their engagement, but to change the long-term culture of the company so that ESG is ingrained in management's thinking as something to weigh and consider in all future business decisions.

ESG investing is a term that combines two concepts: ESG and investing. However, most investment funds on either side of the debate tend to focus on only one of these concepts and ignore the other. Responsible ESG investing means not just being responsible to environmental, social and governance factors, but being a responsible investor to ESG factors and the goal of attaining outsized capital appreciation. This is a main tenet of AESG investing.

Because there is a limited number of investors who have the skillset, characteristics and inclination to actively engage with management of portfolio companies, AESG investment strategies will always be a small subset of aggregate ESG assets. But it will be an increasingly important subset, and those who engage in AESG investing will add a much-needed active component to ESG investing to effect real change and generate real alpha. ESG investing is still a nascent strategy and will continue to develop and evolve. As we see more activist managers start to focus their efforts on ESG improvements, AESG is becoming a significant part of this evolution.

Ken Squire is the founder and president of 13D Monitor, an institutional research service on shareholder activism, and he is the founder and portfolio manager of the 13D Activist Fund, a mutual fund that invests in a portfolio of activist 13D investments. Squire is also the creator of the AESG investment category, an activist investment style focused on improving ESG practices of portfolio companies.

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Activist ESG investing the Goldilocks of responsible investing - CNBC

Porter Novelli’s new Reputation Report: People push for real purpose over ‘posturing and politics’ – PR Newswire

Porter Novelli's new reputational report reveals a new Era of Accountability in Actionand how businesses can do better

NEW YORK, Oct. 6, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Porter Novelli, the strategic communications company built on purpose to do business better, has published its fifth annual research study of corporate reputation: The Purpose Priorities Report: How to respond in the new Era of Accountability. It includes a new Better Business Matrix to help companies navigate current cultural trends and meet the evolving demands of their audiences.

An era of accountability in action

Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, and in the wake of the 2020 social justice movement sparked in part by George Floyd's murder, companies have made many promises to support change. The increase in extreme weather events, caused by climate change, has also sparked more corporate environmental commitments. And now there is a need to show outcomes from all of this as people are looking to companies for leadership.

The report also highlights how consumers are demanding genuine change, not just marketing campaigns.

David Bentley, Global CEO of Porter Novelli, commented: "Good intentions aren't enough. Consumers are tired of talk: they don't want to see campaigns, they want to see action. Companies are realizing the benefits of doing business better as all audiences demand integrity and business growth will depend on navigating the complex landscape of audience expectations."

Addressing the climate crisis is now table stakes for organizations

After fires, floods, and droughts this year, the environment is front and center in consumer minds. While quality products and services are a prerequisite for a thriving business, audiences across allages now expect industry to address sustainability as a core quality issue.

The demand for operational D&I

Social inequalities are now a new second business priority to address, with operational changes expected.

Conroy Boxhill, President of Porter Novelli U.S, commented: "Consumers are looking to businesses for active leadership. The research shows clearly there's now a sense of urgency around companies' DE&I efforts to the point that people are requesting they restructure operationally to drive this change."

Politics can be punishing

In the last couple of years, companies have chosen to wade into political issues like voting rights and Roe v. Wade, but consumers aren't convinced business and politics mix.

Companies should play politics with caution.

Reputation leaders

As part of the report, the strategic communications company has developed a Better Business Matrix. This ranks the reputational leaders by industry, in eight key sectors, mapped to highlight the beneficial impact of Purpose on brand value. It also enables companies to self-diagnose their own reputation, based on the key criterion described in the report. Companies that performed the best within their industries include:

Sandy Skees, Purpose & Impact lead from Porter Novelli, added: "The landscape is shifting rapidly, and this report highlights the changing expectations around sustainability and DEI as examples of purpose in action. The Porter Novelli Better Business matrix is about ensuring companies know how to decode and deliveron environmental and social progress as well as avoiding the pitfalls of political overreach."

The Purpose Priorities Report analyzed the reputation of 200 top companies listed in the Fortune 100, Fortune Best Companies to Work For, World's Most Ethical and the DiversityInc., among others.

"For the past 30 years, Porter Novelli has sought to understand the role of Purpose in company performance," says Andrea List, senior vice president of Data & Insights, the report's lead author. "In that time, the imperative to authentically address social and environmental issues has only grown stronger. This study continues to demonstrate that no corporate reputation can thrive without Purpose."

About the Study

The Purpose Priorities Report presents the findings of an online survey designed and executed in August 2022 among an online sample of 7,000 American adults, ages 18+. The study was fielded by Dynata. Respondents were asked to rate up to six companies each, with each company rated by an average of 150 respondents.

About Porter Novelli

Porter Novelli is the strategic communications company, built on purpose to do business better. Founded 50 years ago by pioneers Jack Porter and Bill Novelli, Porter Novelli is widely considered to be the founder of social marketing. Trailblazers of their time, both Jack and Bill believed that organizations could, and should, be driven by their values, not just by creating value; something intrinsic to how we do business better today. Fast forward 50 years and the world is highly complex. In a shifting landscape of new influences and audience power, Porter Novelli continues to build on this values-driven philosophy and work with ambitious clients to decode change, navigate culture and deepen authenticity to shape reputation and accelerate growth.

About Omnicom Public Relations Group

Omnicom Public Relations Groupis a global collective of three of the top global public relations agencies worldwide and specialist agencies in areas including public affairs, marketing to women, global health strategy and corporate social responsibility. It encompasses more than 6,300 public relations professionals in more than 370 offices worldwide who provide their expertise to companies, government agencies, NGOs, and non-profits across a wide range of industries. Omnicom Public Relations Group delivers for clients through a relentless focus on talent, continuous pursuit of innovation and a culture steeped in collaboration. Omnicom Public Relations Group is part of the DAS Group of Companies, a division of Omnicom Group Inc. (NYSE:OMC) that includes more than 200 companies in a wide range of marketing disciplines including advertising, public relations, healthcare, customer relationship management, events, promotional marketing, branding and research.

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Porter Novelli's new Reputation Report: People push for real purpose over 'posturing and politics' - PR Newswire