From Cover, issue no. 343, November 26th, 2007
Translated by Zuo Maohong
Original article:[Chinese]

Half a million dollars is what it took for former British Prime Minister Tony Blair to endorse Chinese real estate developer Guangdong Guangda Group. The once little-known company has shot to fame overnight as news of Blair's three-hour appearance at one of its properties on November 6th made the rounds of international headlines shortly thereafter.

The mastermind behind the publicity stunt was Yasong China Communications Company.

"We invited Mr. Blair as the spokesman for Guangda in order to win some sudden fame for the company and advertise its villas that will be launched soon," says Qin Gang, its board chairman.

Guangda is a real estate developer that has been building houses around the Shongshan Lake in Dongguan region for years. One of its latest projects is centered around 132 luxury villas priced above 10 million yuan each, due to be launched in December.

Dongguan is situated in southern China's Guangdong province. The region has long been regarded as an undesirable place to live in, thanks to rapid industrialization embodied by mushrooming factories and pollution.

According to Qiao Qijun, Guangda's design director, the villa project is tailored for the riches in the Pearl River Delta. However, the company's reputation is confined to Dongguan, and due to the region's infamous living conditions, it has proven difficult to promote such an extravagant project.

The company realizes that the draw of Dongguan's Shongshan Lake area, which has 70 percent of its land covered by greens surrounding the eight kilometers square of lake, is little known to the outside world.

Thus, Guangda appointed Yasong to begin planning an unusual marketing and branding strategy in September.

Strategizing Moves
"After numerous discussions, we finally reached a consensus to invite a world famous personality, a world class politician at that, as our spokesman," Yasong's Qin says.

Bearing in mind that politicians currently at their posts are hard to invite, Qin then focused on retired ones who still command a certain influence today.