Poms take umbrage – Bloody hell!

The preliminary decision of the UK television broadcasting authority, the Broadcast Advertising Clearance Centre (BACC), to not allow the use of the term ‘bloody’ in Tourism Australia’s new advertising campaign on UK TV will deliver a massive PR boost to Australia, Tourism Australia managing director Scott Morrison said today.

Morrison, who will launch the new campaign in UK next week, said “The campaign was designed to achieve cut through and get people talking, especially online. After just two weeks, we’ve certainly achieved that.

“Already, we estimate that over 100,000 people in the UK have already viewed the ad online through our website www.wherethebloodyhellareyou.com and after the BACC decision this is only going to get better.

“More than 180 destinations advertised on UK television last year to attract tourists and only one of them, Australia, is now getting this type of reaction. The campaign is creating a talkability that marketers only dream about.”

M&C Saatchi, the agency responsible for creating the ad, is less amused. One of its partners Bill Muirhead pointed out that the Broadcast Advertising Clearance Centre – which vets all British TV ads – has allowed ads from companies such as FCUK to go to air.

“It’s bloody pathetic,” said Muirhead, an Australian. “When you look at what’s on air generally [in programming] then look at the sort of ads that get through then it’s ludicrous. We are going to see if we can take legal action.”

Australian tourism minister Fran Bailey reacted angrily to the ruling, saying it was ridiculous that the country which spawned TV shows such as The Benny Hill Show and Little Britain would refuse to allow the tourism ad to go to air.

“How anyone can take offence at a beautiful girl in a bikini on a sunny beach inviting them to visit Down Under is a mystery to me,” she said. “The regulators have clearly misplaced their sense of humour.”

Meanwhile, New South Wales tourism minister Sandra Nori didn’t miss the opportunity for a bit of political point scoring saying the capability of the Federal Government to market Australia overseas has been called into question with the banning of a controversial tourism commercial in the UK.

Nori says the tagline is ineffective and believes more thought should have been put into the campaign.

“If anyone thinks that any publicity is good publicity, they don’t know the first thing about marketing,” she said.

“Perhaps there’ll be a little bit of attention drawn to the ads initially but at the end of the day a multi-million dollar campaign can’t be run because we’ve got one word in there that is banned in one of our key markets.”

In the meantime, Morrison said “We thank the UK authorities for the extra free publicity and invite them to have a ‘bloody’ good holiday in Australia, especially with the Commonwealth Games now on and the Ashes coming up later in the year. To show there are no hard feelings we are happy to extend them an invitation.”