From United Airlines' poor handling of a passenger and the subsequent PR fallout to the world's most effective ad campaigns, these are the most read stories in 2017 from CNBC's "Marketing Media Money".
1. United Airlines isn't alone: Here are some of the worst corporate PR disasters of all time
United Airlines "re-accommodated" a passenger in April, resulting in a stock price fall for parent company . But it's not the first time a major corporation has seen a publicity nightmare: this list of some of the of all time was Marketing Media Money's most-read story of 2017.
2. Kendall Jenner's Pepsi ad pulled after Twitter backlash
An advertisement for Pepsi featuring model Kendall Jenner handing a can of soda to a police officer at a peace protest sparked a backlash online in April, sparking the company to pull the ad. One person wrote on Twitter: "Can't believe Kendall Jenner just solved institutionalized racism and oppression by giving a cop a Pepsi. Groundbreaking."
3. Is the gold rush to digital marketing finally backfiring?
Advertisers are spending ever more cash on digital marketing, with Facebook and Google taking more than half those ad dollars in 2016. But with hief Marketing Officer Marc Pritchard confessing to sometimes being distracted by the latest shiny marketing methods in January, digital advertising was under scrutiny.
4. President Trump's $50 St Patrick's Day cap with big mistake sells out online
Fans of President Donald Trump around St Patrick's Day could buy a green cap featuring "Make America Great Again" on the front, and a plant motif on the back. But there was one problem: the motif sewn into the hat was actually a four-leaf clover, not a shamrock.
5. Adidas steps away from TV advertising as it targets $4 billion growth
In March, said it was leaving behind TV advertising as it seeks to quadruple its e-commerce revenues by 2020, Chief Executive Kasper Rorsted told CNBC. The sportswear company said it was aiming to grow revenues from 1 billion euros ($1.06 billion) in 2016 to 4 billion euros ($4.25 billion) by 2020.
6. These are the 10 most effective advertising campaigns in the world
Whether advertising actually works is a perennial problem for marketers, but this list aimed to show campaigns that resulted in sales. Research company WARC put the list together by analyzing more than 2,000 winners of ad effectiveness awards around the world, in partnership with King's College London. An ad campaign for Ariel in India made the top spot.
7. McDonald's apologizes for 'upsetting' bereavement ad
McDonald's U.K. had to apologize in May after its latest advertising campaign attracted widespread criticism for exploiting childhood bereavement. The advert implied that the boy had little in common with his deceased father other than their shared enjoyment of McDonald's.
8. People are saying McDonald's new uniforms make staff look like evil 'Star Wars' employees and Twitter is not lovin' it
Another McDonald's story in the top 10, this time to do with staff uniforms. As news of the updated designs in shades of gray spread, people on Twitter compared them to the bad guys in "Star Wars," the outfits in science fiction spoof movie "Spaceballs," and to clothing seen in the "Hunger Games" film franchise.
9. Google and Facebook take 20 percent of total global ad spend, top list of world's largest media owners
Media agency Zenith's Top 30 Global Media Owners report, published in May, listed Google's parent company at number one, taking $79.4 billion, followed by , which earned $26.9 billion in advertising revenue.
10. Trump's digital campaign director was paid $1,500 to set up his election website. Then he raked in $94 million when Trump won
This is the story of Brad Parscale, digital director for Donald Trump's presidential campaign. In 2015, Parscale was running a website design company and he got an email. "It said: 'Donald Trump is thinking about running for president and we need a website in two days,'" Parscale told CBS News' "60 Minutes," in October. "So I wrote back and said, 'Yeah, I'll do it for $1,500,'" he added. "And by the end (of the election campaign) it was $94 million."