Astronomer — the B2B tech company now known worldwide because its married, now-ex CEO got caught canoodling on camera with its married, now-ex head of HR at a Coldplay concert — released an advertisement cashing in on the notoriety. Audacious. But is it a smart crisis communications move? And is it one that others should emulate?

The ad, released July 25, features actress Gwyneth Paltrow (pictured) as “temporary spokesperson.” In a cheeky bit of business, Paltrow is the ex-wife of Coldplay lead singer Chris Martin, who, during the infamous July 16 “kiss cam” incident, pondered aloud from the stage whether the CEO and HR head were having an affair.

In the minute-long ad, Paltrow talks about Astronomer’s business, with only subtweet-like interstitial text referring humorously to the kiss-cam episode. “Thank you for your interest in Astronomer,” she begins and ends the spot. Mostly she talks about things like “data-workflow automation.” The ad has more than 37 million views on X and 650,000 on YouTube.

To make the video, Astronomer turned to Maximum Effort, the agency started by actor Ryan Reynolds, whose wife, actress Blake Livey, is dealing with her own crisis in the form of her litigation with actor and director Justin Baldoni.

Kiss-Cam Calamity

In using the kiss-cam calamity to launch a marketing effort, Astronomer is breaking some crisis communications best practices. One reason it’s able to do so is that the situation really wasn’t a crisis of its own making. Astronomer wasn’t at fault and could even be seen as a victim of its executives’ non-mindfulness. Astronomer also addressed the problem by having the CEO and HR head resign.

What are the best practices Astronomer is breaking?

First, it’s typical after addressing a crisis for a company to lay low and let things cool off before making any major moves. With the Paltrow effort, Astronomer is jumping right in. The company has decided it’s right to seize the moment. In our view, it’s yet to be seen whether that’s wise. But it shows the faster-moving nature of crisis comms.

Second, Astronomer is using humor, which is generally counseled against in crisis communications. It’s usually not worth the risk of upsetting certain stakeholders by cracking jokes in the middle of a negative situation.

Again, the company may be able to get away with both violations because it didn’t really cause the crisis — and it seems viewers did generally find the video funny. Communicators should consider whether the crisis they’re enmeshed in can be similarly used. Probably not — especially if you’re at fault.

Brand Building

Another touchy subject is that Astronomer is using this negative event to build its brand. From the beginning, it’s tried to pivot from talk about the infamous incident to talk about what it does for a living — to change the narrative, as it were. Building a brand off the back of a crisis — especially one so recent — is gutsy but tricky. It could backfire.

Most important, Astronomer is a B2B company. Its target audience isn’t influencers and busybodies who spend their days and nights on social media and who are riveted by, and enjoying the schadenfreude of, the ex-executives’ woes. Will decisionmakers at potential company clients be turned off by the move?

Be that as it may, Astronomer is pushing ahead. “As Gwyneth Paltrow said, now it’s time for us to return to what we do best: delivering game-changing results for our customers,” interim Astronomer CEO Pete DeJoy wrote in a LinkedIn post on Sunday.

Photo Credit: Astronomer