The Finnish daily newspaper Helsingin Sanomoat welcomed US President Trump and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in a digital and critical way. Finland’s largest daily booked almost 300 digital screens and billboards on the route between the airport and the summit venue – and gets serious.
The message is simple: “Mr. President, welcome to the land of the free press.” The paper, founded in 1889 – Finland’s largest circulation and most influential daily newspaper – welcomed the two presidents with a clear and snappy message. Headlines from 2000 to 2018 are used for this purpose, which refer to Putin’s and Trump’s handling of press freedom – bad news to start with. The campaign messages are displayed alternately in English and Russian on the digital advertising media.
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With this campaign, Helsingin Sanomoat wants to support press colleagues around the world whose rights are restricted or who are massively harassed by governments. And the United States and Russia are part of the club of countries where there is definitely still room for improvement.
According to Helsingin Sanomoat: On the World Press Freedom Index compiled around 180 countries, Russia is in 148th place – and the USA is only ranked 45th. A much better place than Russia, but still far from the top. For comparison: Norway, Sweden and the Netherlands make up the top 3 countries in terms of press freedom in 2018. Finland ranks 4th in the ranking, followed by Switzerland in 5th. Austria ranks 11th – and Germany ranks 15th.
If the summit of the two alpha males ends without an agreement, they can once again pass the buck to the press – see below. And Trump, who recently described the EU as an “enemy”, can then add apologetically that they met in “enemy territory” – after all, Finland is not only not a NATO member, but has been a member of the EU since 1995.
A great example of how flexible and politically DooH can be used.
