The opening of the new Museum of Failure in Los Angeles got us thinking about why marketing and public relations are so important– at first we were going to write an analytical piece pulling from scholarly sources about why startups need to retain a marketing and PR firm.

However, that seemed a little dry for the week after New Year’s Eve. Therefore, as a gift to our readers, we’ve created a piece over the greatest marketing disasters of all time, because everybody loves a good trainwreck – (and that’s not just a metaphor).

Social media ad sales have exploded exponentially in the past two years and is expected to pass $11 billion by 2017. If you’re one of those late businesses to embrace the new wave of social trendiness, you are costing yourself money.