“I would build a great wall, and nobody builds walls better than me, believe me, and I’ll build them very inexpensively. I will build a great great wall on our southern border and I’ll have Mexico pay for that wall.”
— Donald J. Trump. Campaign Launch Speech. June 16th, 2015
From American Tobacco Company’s (in) famous 1929 Torches of Freedom campaign – arguably the very first public relations campaign in the world that simultaneously changed social attitude toward women smokers and popularized cigarettes among women,– to WWF’s (World Wildlife Fund) 2008 tsunami campaign that almost instantaneously tanked the conservation group’s hard-won reputation, endless cases can be made for and against intentionally generating controversy as a strategic communications technique. What this technique means in the age of social media for brands and its effectiveness in the realm of marketing is what we will be taking a look at in this blog post.
Exhibit I: It all started with a kneel
On the afternoon of December 2nd, 2015, Mario Woods, 26, suspect of an earlier stabbing, died of 20 gunshot wounds inflicted by the San Francisco police. This at-the-time little known incident reached national headlines in the United States later (be more specific, when is “later”?), mobilizing waves of demonstrations and protests against institutionalized police brutality against non-white Americans. One of many individuals who felt “loss, pain and anger” was San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick.
By refusing to stand and later unapologetically kneeling during national anthem, the American footballer’s high-profile protest against racial injustice was quick to draw both admiration and vehement condemnation – including former U.S. President Donald Trump’s infamous “Get that son of a bitch off the field”, and has left him an outcast with the NFL ownership since 2017.
In 2018, Nike brought Kaepernick back to the epicenter of public discourse in the U.S. as the feature of the brand’s 30th anniversary campaign. With a simple line reading “Believe in something. Even if it means sacrificing everything.” on a black-and-white Kaepernick picture, the sports giant once again reignited the bitter antagonism so deeply embedded within the American society.
Within minutes, the collective shock turned visceral. Critics started to post videos of themselves destroying Nike sportswear and declaring boycott of the brand, whereas on the other side, supporters proclaimed ever greater loyalty to the brand for standing up to progressive ideals. At first, many suspected that just as Kaepernick’s initial kneel sent NFL into a dive in rating, Nike’s announcement would see the brand suffer as well.
Exhibit II: A burger that has gone bad
A burger chain is known not for its burgers but its provocative, sexist, and highly discriminating ads, Carl’s Jr,. has made a highly controversial name for itself in the first two decades of the 21st century by depicting scantily clad female supermodels devouring their burgers.
One such ad is released in 2005, where Paris Hilton starred in a Carl’s Jr. commercial car-washing in a bikini while,– biting huge chunks off a Carl’s Jr. burger. Controversy followed immediately. On top of resulting in considerable protests against the commercial, the ad also gained, in a short time, so many views that the company’s website crashed.
Perhaps mistaking the reaction to such shameless objectification of women as an opportunity, instead of backing off and recognizing the problematic aspects of the ad, Carl’s Jr. saw this as a gold mine – and doubled down. Based on the 2005 Hilton commercial, in the following decade, the company aired ad after ad featuring close to naked female celebrities engaging in dubious activities with their burgers that really reminded one – in no uncertain terms – not of burgers.
For a while, the ads seemed to work just as intended. The picture above – from Kate Upton’s 2012 Carl’s Jr. ad, received more than 4.5 million views online shortly after airing, and pocketed more than 120,000 likes for its post on Carl’s Jr. and Hardee’s Facebook page. And yet each time, backlash gained a bit more momentum.
The chain’s 2013 ad for its Memphis BBQ burger was banned in New Zealand for being sexually explicit and degrading. Three years later in neighboring Australia, similar backlash broke out when the Carl’s Jr. opened its first Australian store in Bateau Bay, New South Wales with Sydney-based model Gemie Howe starring in its predictably racy launch commercial, which has been described as “porn-themed”.
It’s hard to gauge precisely what more than a decade of sexist commercials brought to the burger chain, but in 2017, after its parent company, CKE Restaurant Holdings parted way with its long-time CEO, Andrew Pudzer – a staunch supporter of the controversial ads, Carl’s Jr. made an abrupt U-turn. In a 3-minute-long commercial featuring a Carl Sr. figure’s return, the company came as close as it can get to distancing itself from past racy commercials and promised a “return” to making itself a burger place in the eyes of consumers again– a telling sign that the brand has realized that in order to appeal to younger, more progressive-minded costumers around the world, the kind of controversies it sought to put itself in the limelight with, i.e., debasing women into mere sex objects, was maybe not serving its own interests after all.
Final Thoughts
Together descending upon us alongside the domineering presence of social media and information hyper-fluidity is a much more inconspicuous looking phenomenon – the attention economy. Bold-lettered clickbait no longer seem to be enough. Something more needs to be done to keep the brand at the epicenter of public discourse.
Given the brand is open withstanding both positivity and negativity generated by controversy and can count on the continued support of its existing fan base, a smartly engineered controversy might be just what is needed to snatch that limelight all for itself to make an unforgettable impression, if only for just a few fleeting moments.
At Smplcty:
We focus on effective and efficient integrated marketing solutions for technology and lifestyle brands. If you are interested in what we do or want to discuss more about the marketing situation in general, feel free to drop us a message.
You can find us on social media or via email. Come and say hi!
Related Articles
The post Trick of the Trade, but Not as Simple as it Looks – A Brief Look at Controversy as a Marketing Tactic appeared first on SMPLCTY.
