Negative publicity: Mistake or By Design?
Belfast Telegraph: Nike Panned Over Black and Tan ads
Nike unveiled their Black and Tan trainers in Ireland in celebration of St. Patrick’s Day. In the United States, the Black and Tan is a popular drink, but in Ireland it was the name of a right-wing terrorist group in the early 1920′s that the Royal Irish Constabulary used to try to put down the revolution.
The Black and Tans committed many atrocities against the Irish people, so naming a new shoe after them so many believe that wasn’t a smart move. In this Future of Engagement episode, host Murray Newlands looks at how social media responded to the mishap:
While Murray mentions on the video that Nike should have done their homework, I have to wonder if this wasn’t a calculated move on their part to generate what Murray quotes some referring to as “A Media Circus”.
Prominently on the first page of Google – at least today – for the phrase “Black and Tan” are a Wikipedia entry and the History of the Irish Black and Tans on HistoryLearningSite.co.uk which makes it hard to believe Nike was not aware.
This is especially true given that Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream already created controversy doing the same thing and Nike having a history of offensive ads including a “truly horrible” anti-Christian Nike ad and the Tiger Woods Scandal Nike Ad.
While most brands would avoid negative coverage, there is an old advertising adage that says:
“There is no such thing as bad publicity.”
That is often true because there is a ton of visibility to be gained from it and most of the time the brand will stick in people’s memories much longer than the controversy.
I just hope people realize that what a brand does reflects on their principles.
Highlights
- Lots of coverage was on Facebook since there were a lot of pictures
- 26% of social media coverage was negative
- Brands can learn to do their homework before they launch brands in other countries
Graphs courtesy of Alerti social media monitoring and management
Sign up for a free 3 month Alerti trial using the code alertivideo.
What do YOU think about what Nike did?
Would your brand run a campaign that would
generate negative buzz on purpose?Share your thoughts in the comments below.
{ 30 comments… read them below or add one }
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I can’t believe I’m seeing this again, I felt like I was the only person that heard about this when it happened. Most of the world born in the last 50 years, and by extension Nike’s customers, have no clue what Black and Tans are other than the drink and the shoes. It seems ridiculous to cater to every group that gets offended unless your goal is a stagnated, nerf’ed world.
Joshua would love you to read ..Sites that pay
I also agree that big brands like Nike care less about the sentiments of a few and all which they are concerned with sales. And what could be more controversial than this launch at St.Patrick’s Day. They might create marketing opportunities for their products but doing so make people loose their trust among them.
Twitter: charlesfyler
March 29, 2012 at 10:05 am
Surely this is a mistake. The idea of a corporation marketing a product to offend a segment of the population flies in the face of how corporations function -without emotion. I would say that a market study would have found the true history of the “Black and Tans”, but the marketability of alcohol probably outweighed the unmarketability of an offensive name to a small segment of the global population.
Twitter: rackservers
March 28, 2012 at 12:40 am
The saddest part of this debate is that I agree that these shoes will probably sell… perhaps Nike could send an apology to Ireland?
Twitter: dragonblogger
March 27, 2012 at 10:43 am
This reminds me of the Psych episode where they were Black and Tan the modeling team, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ExYF3Dzzdak you have to watch this video clip, it is hilarious. “I can’t believe you just made that assumption”
Justin Germino would love you to read ..Living in a Future without DVD Drives
Now very soon because of this controversy, everyone will start talking about this new model and ultimately this will be the hit. Nike has a neck to neck competition with Adidas & reebok, so the launch has to be very impressive, They done this intentionally, such a big brand, very good advertising and marketing agencies would be handling the brand, they can’t commit such a mistake.
There is a huge creative department in every advertising agencies, before making any new advertisement Marketing research group research everything related to the product and it is not a 1 day job and Nike is such a big brand. So no way it was a mistake, now just check the sale of these shoes will touch the sky because People want to wear the brands which is much talked about.
Positive or negative publicity, this will sell. Most likely, the people who’ll buy this pair of shoes don’t know about the terrorist group, therefore won’t associate it with atrocity and violence nor glorify them. And yes, Nike knows what it’s doing.
I think we must respect what the “Nike Management” have done their publicity in this Nike thingy. I know in everything they do they’ve been doing it legally and fair to anybody else. They’re fame won’t be sacrifice because of this.
Chris Barker would love you to read ..Online backup for PC & Mac
I can’t help thinking that its tangential connection to a popular alcoholic beverage or an unpopular terrorist cell would have ‘very’ little effect on my motivation when it came to buying a pair of shoes.
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