Speaking about a country’s image is a serious business. However, this campaign proves that a national brand with some obvious misperception problems can be restored through a funny approach that engages audiences rather than being told what to think.

“What a fun time to be here” is an exclusive PR campaign for improving Romania’s image that proves one fundamental element of PR practice today: compared to institutions, people can be better campaigners if a proper environment is created. “What a fun time to be here” is an example of combining real and virtual PR, and showcases the results of using both content generated by the client and crowd– casting a combination of push and pull strategies to first engage an audience and build a network of participants and then harness the network for new insights. And when such a campaign generates revenues instead of spending them, the value of PR is even higher.

In terms of results, after 3 months of the campaign, we created a community of more than 40,000 people who created funny and genuine experiences about Romania, huge media interest about the project (200 articles released about the project) and a state of mind that encourages people to make their own project for improving Romania’s image.

The whole campaign aimed to mix virtual and real worlds by creating happenings with the potential to be spread on both mediums and to give people a platform to express themselves: Virtual Bucharest 1. Teaser campaign on social media (November 15-30 2008) creating a huge media interest for the topic (November 25-30);2. Interviews about the project (November 25-30);3. Launch of Virtual Bucharest through a virtual event that was broadcast live on TV (December 1, 2008)4. Create conditions that people make their own happenings in both virtual and real Bucharest - “free hugs” created by a campaigner in Virtual Bucharest and another 26 real Romanian cities (01.12.2008)5. Virtual art museum and books about Bucharest (December 5-15, 2008)6. “Pick the parrot’s ticket” - people could buy a ticket predicting the future picked by a parrot avatar from a bunch of tickets (December 31,2008)7. Create the first marketplace in Virtual Bucharest to give the project a financial autonomy.

• 199 articles about the project released in 3 months, cumulating a total audience of 16.5 million people in Romania and 2.57 million people abroad• 12,221 visitors in Virtual Bucharest on the first day of opening, 20,296 visitors during the first week, an average of 45,432 visitors daily after 3 months of project activation and a peak of 76,589 visitors per day on February 2.• Virtual Bucharest ranks the 3rd in best cases presented by Second Life with a loyal community of more than 40,000 people.• 50% of the commercial areas available in the marketplace were rented by local entrepreneurs, giving the project total financial autonomy.