Category: Single Minded2c3169a786

Coopting Commencement

5/3/2020

by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

People are missing out on many favorite activities because of the pandemic, but not being able to eat in a restaurant or go to the movies are small sacrifices compared to the major life events some have been forced to forgo: weddings, honeymoons, graduations. Some caring companies have stepped in to ease the pain, but could their efforts actually be causing more harm?

As one who’s taught in higher education for two decades, I certainly appreciate the significance of college commencement. I’ve had a front row seat to thousands of students’ struggles and success over their four-year college careers, as well as to their graduation days, which are meaningful tributes marking the culmination of a lifetime of formal education.

When students’ academic journeys conclude, there’s tremendous relief and joy! The about-to-be graduates are excited, and their proud parents and grandparents are often even more animated—sometimes embarrassingly so. Families and friends want to be together to witness their loved one walk across the stage and to celebrate their momentous accomplishment.

Tragically, those celebrations will not happen on most college campuses this spring, as the coronavirus has pulled the plug on virtually all large group gatherings for the foreseeable future. While many formerly in-person experiences have been moved online, some with very little distortion, it seems impossible to replicate electronically the sights, sounds, and feelings of an on-campus commencement ceremony.

However, one ‘institution’ is making a great effort to ensure that this spring everyone’s graduation (high school, college, or other) is memorable. It’s not an organization you’d likely guess, but it is one with which you’re probably familiar: Anheuser-Busch. The King of Beers will play the role of principal and president at a very unique commencement event.

Natural Light, one of Anheuser-Busch’s many beer brands, will host “a virtual college commencement ceremony on Facebook Live to celebrate graduates around the world.” The ceremony will take place at 7:00 pm Eastern Time on Thursday, May 14, on Natural Light’s Facebook Page.

Graduating seniors who sign up in advance will have their names read on a “branded commencement microsite” by celebrities Shep Rose and Arianny Celeste. The event’s speakers will include, among others, Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban and ESPN sports commentator Stephen A. Smith.

It’s great to see companies giving to those who tragedy has impacted physically, emotionally, and socially. Anheuser-Busch has a history of such corporate social responsibility; for instance, it has “donated nearly 83 million cans of emergency drinking water to disaster relief since 1988.”

Given the personalities employed, “Natty’s Worldwide Commencement” is likely to be an expensive event for its sponsor, even though done entirely online. It looks like the company wants to lift the spirits of soon-to-be grads, but are there other reasons Anheuser-Busch is willing to go to such effort and expense to offer an education-related event for free?

The rather obvious answer is that the firm wants to ‘teach’ young people to drink more Natural Light. A recent article in Marketing Dive suggests the same motive:

“Natural Light is attempting to make up for [coronavirus-related] losses while drumming up brand awareness among its core college-aged consumers. By providing this experience to young consumers during a difficult time, the brand could build good will and position itself in a positive light to help it nurture a loyal following of beer drinkers in the future.”

The fact that Anheuser-Busch’s motives for the commencement ceremony are not solely altruistic isn’t necessarily a problem. I, for one, am a firm believer that individuals and organizations can and often do successfully maintain more than one motive at a time, i.e., they can realize multiple goals simultaneously. Whether it’s a marriage relationship or a customer relationship, people often receive benefits from others, even as they give them.

There’s also not necessarily anything wrong with a beer company building pandemic-era brand equity by tapping positive consumer sentiment. Miller High Life, for instance, is running a contest to help couples get married at home. Thanks to the Miller Brewing Company, three engaged couples will win a “Wedding at Your Doorstep,” which includes beer, a photographer, an officiant, and $10,000 for honeymoon expenses. The company even promises to cover cancelled wedding costs.

So, what could be problematic with Anheuser-Busch’s product positioning? The issue is the target market. The company seems to be specifically targeting college students and is likely appealing to those even younger with its Natural Light line, which contains teen-friendly flavors like Strawberry Lemonade Beer and Strawberry Kiwi [hard] Seltzer.

Natty’s Worldwide Commencement is one piece of evidence that supports the college-targeting claim, but there’s more, such as an Anheuser-Busch promotion offering free beer to anyone turning 21, and a YouTube-based campaign to find a summer intern. Based on such evidence, Marketing Dive has deduced: “Natural Light in recent years has narrowed its marketing focus to reach college students.”

What’s more, aspirational purchase behavior often leads to target market creep: People who technically are not part of a target market buy its products because they want to be like those who are the ‘in’ group. For teens, this behavior often translates into wanting a more mature appearance and purchasing items aimed at those older than them.

What’s the connection to Natural Light’s Worldwide Commencement? It has to do with demographics. The National Center for Education Statistics projected that about 19.9 million students attended degree-granting postsecondary institutions in the fall of 2019. Of them, approximately 4.27 million (21.45%) were 19 years old or younger.

Another 4.47 million were either 20 or 21 years old. A conservative estimate is that 25% of those students, or 1.1 million, will not turn 21 by the end of May, which means nearly 27% of college students in the 2019-2020 academic year are 20 years old or younger (4.27 + 1.1 = 5.37 million / 19.9 million = 26.98%). In addition, almost all high school seniors are just 17 or 18 years old.

Anheuser-Busch’s target market for Natural Light is troubling in two ways. First, other than some rare exceptions, the legal drinking age in the United States is 21. For older college students, that’s not an issue, but for 27% of them and virtually all high school students, alcohol consumption is illegal.

Second, although many people do drink responsibly, there are potentially serious risks associated alcohol abuse, to which teens are especially susceptible. Here are some of the ‘sobering’ statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention:

Alcohol is the most commonly used and abused drug among youth in the United States.
On average, underage drinkers consume more drinks per drinking occasion than adult drinkers.
Those aged 12 to 20 years drink 11% of all alcohol consumed in the United States and more than 90% of the time are involved in binge drinking.
After drinking, 6% of youth drove and 17% rode with a driver who had been drinking.
Outcomes of underage drinking include changes in brain development, poor academic performance, social and legal problems, imprudent sexual practices, physical and sexual assault, and higher instances of suicide and homicide.
Every year, more the 4,300 underage youth die from excessive drinking.

Those who read my blog regularly might remember another time I took issue with marketers associating alcohol and academia. In January of 2017, I wrote a piece, “Alcohol Ads and College Athletics Don't Mix,” that questioned the NCAA’s designation of Dos Equis as “The Official Beer Sponsor of the College Football Playoff.”

It’s not that I thought another beer brand would be a better sponsor. I argued that having any alcohol company as an official sponsor of college athletics was “a paradoxical distinction that further propagates the false compatibility of beer and books, drunkenness and diligence, wasted-ness and wellness.”

In some ways, I believe Anheuser-Busch’s decision to sponsor a college commencement ceremony is even worse. First, its positioning as an event for ‘all graduates’ means it may reach an even younger demographic, which definitely doesn’t need any additional enticement to drink.

Second, while a graduation is a celebration, it should be a dignified one. Yes, people of age can choose to drink beer during a football game or soccer match, but they shouldn’t be drinking during a high school graduation or college commencement. Yet, that’s exactly what Natural Light encouraged in a Facebook post on April 9:

“Graduation ceremony cancelled? Sucks, but we got your back. We’re throwing a worldwide commencement ceremony for the class of 2020 . . . Plus, you get to drink beer.”

Another significant part of commencement is the stole that drapes over certain graduates’ shoulders, conveying special honors or individual achievement. As shown in a Facebook post on April 24, Anheuser-Busch has diminished that symbol of “prestigious recognition” by silk-screening Natural Light logos on a custom-made stole that it “might” send to those who like or share the post. Perhaps it's a stole for those who 'minored in binge drinking' and 'majored in partying.'

Finally, important but sometimes overlooked roles in a commencement ceremony are the people who read the names of the graduates. Where I work, those individuals are the deans of our various schools. As a graduate, it’s an honor to have your name read by an accomplished scholar or respected teacher. It’s another thing to have it ready by someone who’s resume includes “UFC ring girl” and “Playboy model.”

As a college professor and a marketer, I appreciate the need for partnerships between corporations and higher education. In fact, without the former’s support, most colleges and universities either could not exist or could not begin to serve students in the ways that they do. Tuition revenue typically cannot cover all operating costs or fund large capital projects like academic buildings, dormitories, and sports complexes.

Higher education needs business, and business needs higher education, for instance, to help prepare the next generation of employees. Everyone needs companies that respect the educational process and the people who participate in it, especially its young and most malleable consumers. Unfortunately, Anheuser-Busch’s global graduation ceremony is a thinly-veiled promotional-grab that offers no genuine respect for either.

Over the last month-and-a-half, I’ve been meeting via video conference twice a week with the students in our capstone marketing class, all of whom are seniors. Each time I see their faces on a computer screen, I feel for their loss—unable to enjoy campus life for their final semester. However, I’m sure each of these marketing majors, who have learned what it means to market for mutual benefit, can see past Natural Light’s benevolence façade and recognize the long-term risk its pop-culture ceremony holds for their peers.

It's nice that a star-studded event may temporarily lift the spirits of some of those most regrettably impacted by COVID-19. However, disregard for educational decorum and the well-being of those most vulnerable to alcohol’s harmful effects, earns Anheuser-Busch a degree in “Single-Minded Marketing.”

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Should the FCC Have Thrown a Flag?

2/7/2020

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by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

The latest Super Bowl was another big game mired in controversy. This time the debate wasn’t whether a fourth-quarter play was a penalty, but whether the halftime show was pornography. Should the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) have thrown a flag for ‘illegal use of the hips’ or ‘unnecessary raunchiness’? As armchair apologists argue, mindful marketers aim to analyze the action from each angle, hoping to make ‘the right call.’

Rocking hips, pulsing pelvises, and legs wrapped around a stripper pole sound like a scene from a gentleman’s club, but they were just part of the Super Bowl LIV halftime show featuring superstar entertainers Shakira and Jennifer Lopez.

Whether one enjoyed the performances or not, most agree that the show was a production spectacle, complete with elaborate scenery, extravagant costumes, moving stages, dozens of talented dancers, and amazing fireworks. The production level was fitting for the biggest television viewing event of the year, which this time drew an astounding 102.1 million U.S. viewers, making it the “11th most-watched TV show ever.”

With so many people watching the same thing, it’s not surprising that the show spawned differences of opinion. Some, like former Florida governor and U.S. presidential candidate Jeb Bush loved it; he tweeted, “Best Super Bowl halftime show ever.”

Many ordinary citizens have also sung its praises, including 2.3 million people who liked the YouTube video. Some of those fans have said:

“One of the most amazing shows ever.”—Lucy B.
“Loved both”--manel manel
“whos watched this more than 10 times? i know i aint the only guy”—Maxwel Rajcic
“I love JLo but i can't get over that Shakira performance. Damn.”—Annitah Lesley
“One of the best Super Bowl halftime show ever”—grace khuvung

However, a smaller but still substantial number (134K YouTube viewers) didn’t think the show was ‘so hot’; actually, they thought it was too hot. Some tweeted:

“I saw way more of J-Lo than I ever wanted to. There was a moment there that actually made me blink my eyes. Everybody in the room was blinking their eyes.”— @TheAnnoyedMan
“When your crotch shot reveals your panty liner than you’ve definitely crossed a line”—@meredithdicken1
“I’d settle for a halftime that is somewhere between Karen Carpenter and a pelvic exam.”—@Bookwormdearlor
“My 13 year girl old said ‘man, that was TRASHY.’”—@FilthyMcN
“My 9 year old asked, ‘Is this what sexy is?’”—@kdonohuenj
“It was inappropriate for the venue. They can't sell it as a family entertainment and then present something that millions of people had to quickly turn off AFTER their little people got an eyeful of soft porn.”—@Plainsspeak

Maybe detractors are being over-sensitive or narrow-minded, not giving enough consideration to factors such as:

The empowerment of women: The halftime show showcased two women’s exceptional voices and dance skills, physical strength and stamina, as well as their abilities to command one of the world’s largest stages. Furthermore, both women are over 40 years of age.
The celebration of Latin culture: The show served up large portions of energy and excitement, along with vibrant sounds and colors, for which Latin culture is known.

Those are valid arguments that we may not fully appreciate, depending on our own demographics. On the other hand, one may wonder if those lauding the performance have considered issues like these:

Demographics: Unlike most TV shows, an extremely wide swath of the population watches the Super Bowl—everyone from two-year-olds to 92-year-olds. The lower end of that range should not be exposed to sexually explicit content, and many would argue that no one should see it without warning at 8:00 pm, on broadcast television.
Legality: The halftime show may have violated the FCC’s mandate that “Indecent and profane content are prohibited on broadcast TV and radio between 6 a.m. and 10 p.m., when there is a reasonable risk that children may be in the audience.” It’s hard to imagine that the agency would have allowed the same sexual content, which included very revealing apparel and highly suggestive camera shots, as part of a 30-second Super Bowl commercial; yet, the FCC permitted 14 minutes of the ‘exposure’ as a Pepsi-sponsored mini-program.
Addiction: If the halftime show represented ‘soft porn,’ as some have said, there’s a risk that the show encouraged pornography addiction for some viewers. Lest one think that’s a wild claim, check out Google search results: In the period from January 29, 2020 through February 4, 2020, at the exact time of the Super Bowl halftime show, there were extreme peaks in searches for terms such as: Hustlers (name of the film about strip clubs, staring Lopez), pole dance, stripper, and jlo hustlers dance.

Cultural relativism: Virtually every culture, past and present, has had good things to offer, but not everything in a given culture is good (e.g., segregation, subjugation of women). Latin dancing is known for its sensuality, which people may debate is good or bad, but for the situation at hand, the discussion should consider the prevailing culture and composition of Super Bowl viewers, as well as when, where, and with whom most watched the halftime show.
Empowerment or Objectification: As implied above, my maleness limits my ability to appreciate the ways in which Shakira and J Lo’s performances may have made other viewers feel empowered. However, as one who has studied oversexualization in advertising, I saw many signs of objectification of women, i.e., reducing their personhood to specific body parts (e.g., legs, bottoms) and ‘serving them up’ as objects for others’ sexual gratification. For instance, in the YouTube video of the performance, there’s a camera shot at about 2:22 focused just on Shakira’s belly and hips, i.e., no head or feet, and another at 7:06 centered squarely on Lopez’s bottom, as she bent over, back to the camera.

In an article that includes several helpful illustrations, Ronnie Richie develops a seemingly useful distinction between sexual objectification and empowerment, the bottom-line being that a person is sexually empowered, not objectified, when she/he holds power versus the person looking at them. That analysis likely works on one level, such as for superstar celebrities like Shakira and J Lo, but the reality is that oversexualized images in mass media often impact others within the same people group (e.g., women, children) with tragic consequences.

According to UNICEF, “The objectification and sexualization of girls in the media is linked to violence against women and girls worldwide.” On a personal level, former Yale University student Veronica Lira Ortiz shared her unfortunate experience as a child in a Latin culture infused with machismo: “I was twelve years old, and a man on the street [in Mexico] was already verbally harassing me. He looked at me as if I were a juicy steak instead of an innocent child. Shakira and J Lo may have held power in their Super Bowl situation, but many indirectly affected by their performances do not.

“Beauty is in the eye of the beholder,” but when the beholders number over 100 million, including millions of children and adults anticipating family-friendly entertainment, and when many others are indirectly affected by what’s shown, the creators and broadcasters of ‘said beauty’ should demonstrate better discretion. So, the replay of the action suggests that the FCC should have flagged Fox, Pepsi, and others associated with the Super Bowl LIV halftime show for a broadcast communication violation, as well as for “Single-Minded Marketing.”

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Fighting Fire with Desire

1/12/2020

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by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

Earthquakes, hurricanes, floods—natural disasters are unfortunate reminders of how powerful earth is and how weak humans are. Yet, in the wake of such tragedies it’s encouraging to see caring people help others in need. So why has one woman’s philanthropy aimed at fire relief for Australia sparked a media firestorm?

Since late July, “Australia is [still] being ravaged by the worst wildfires seen in decades.” A terrible drought and record-high temperatures are helping fuel the horrific flames. So far, the tragic toll includes 27 people dead, over 2,000 homes destroyed just in the state of New South Wales, smoke 11-times the hazard level in Sydney, more than 17.9 million acres of land burned, and millions of animals likely dead.

Thankfully there are organizations and individuals responding to the tragedy. One of those people is Kaylen Ward. An attractive 20-year model from Los Angeles, Ward tweeted a promise on January 3 to send a picture of herself to anyone who sent her proof of a donation of $10 or more to a legitimate fire relief organization such as the Australian Red Cross or Salvation Army Australia. Ward kept her promise, and within four days, her efforts helped raise an amazing $1 million!

Why has Ward’s work been so successful and controversial? It was because she wasn’t wearing anything in the photos; Ward was nude.

The people receiving the pictures, weren’t surprised—they got exactly what Ward promised and what might be expected from an “influencer and sex worker” who makes a living from nakedness, often by selling nude photos and videos of herself on OnlyFans. Recently, she’s come to call herself “The Naked Philanthropist.”

One reason people have taken issue with Ward’s promotion of wildfire relief was a perception that she must somehow be skimming money off the top for herself. However, she quickly clapped back at such allegations, tweeting that “none of the donation money to Australia has or ever will go to me. The only money I have made is money from my [Only]fans. I guarantee I am not pocketing any donation money.”

Given that people donated directly to the relief organizations and just direct messaged Ward copies of receipts, she had no access to the money. In contrast, Ward apparently incurred some direct costs from her philanthropy. After her initial tweet went viral (over 88K retweets and more than 226K likes), she said she had to hire four people to help her sort through all of the messages, verify the donations, and send out over 10,000 nude photos.

It’s likely, though, that whatever those cost were, they were more than offset by all the free media ‘exposure’ (sorry) she’s received, probably worth at least tens of thousands of dollars, not to mention the contact list of future customers she undoubtedly built from all those who direct messaged her for a free pic.

Likewise, Ward’s social media following exploded. Before her first ‘fire relief post’ she had about 176K Twitter followers. She now has over 387K.

Knowing those positive personal outcomes, some may argue that her philanthropy was intentionally self-serving. Ward takes issue with that assessment, however, saying that she had seen the impact of the recent California fires firsthand and knows “how devasting” they can be.

Also, soon after stopping her nude photos promotion, Ward started a GoFundMe campaign aimed at raising money for the New South Wales Rural Fire Service and the World Wildlife Fund. She stated: “I want to continue raising funds to save the people and animals of Australia,” because the causes are “very important to me.”

It’s hard to judge motives. There’s also not necessarily anything wrong with a person wanting both to help others and to advance his/her own career. Many forward-thinking organizations take a similar strategic approach to their philanthropy such that they do well financially while doing good socially.

But, then there’s the specific nature of Ward’s career. It’s pornography.

Many individuals and organizations believe that there are standards of decency that should be upheld, including ones involving sexual explicitness. Facebook, which owns Instagram, is one of those organizations: It disabled Ward’s Instagram account because she apparently violated the site’s prohibition of offering nude images.

Some may say, though, that the means justify the ends, i.e., given the devastation Australia has endured, ‘baring’ oneself is acceptable in order to provide relief to those in need. Such an argument usually stems from a belief in consequentialism, or that the greatest net happiness is what determines whether an action is ethical, not freestanding moral principles like decency, dignity, and decorum.

But, if one considers consequences, there’s a need to look at all the consequences likely to come from Ward sharing her nakedness. Those include consequences associated with pornography. Here are several of the negative outcomes that individuals often experience from using porn, provided by Caron Andrews:

Changes the brain: Through the release of dopamine each time, the brain requires more and more porn.
Affects behavior: Porn users often have more violent attitudes toward women and exhibit more domineering and harassing behavior toward them.
Leads to sexual dysfunction: Actual physical intimacy becomes less stimulating.
Harms one’s sense of sexuality: Porn can cause people to have deviant and even dangerous sexual tastes.
Stunts real-life relationships: Users often draw away from others and keep secrets from them.
Teaches that women are sexual objects: Women are often ‘stripped’ of dignity and presented as vehicles for men’s sexual satisfaction.
Makes people feel bad about themselves: The lack of congruity between one’s values and actions causes stress and feelings of hypocrisy.
Changes moods: People who use porn are often easily annoyed, angered, and depressed.

The preceding list isn’t comprehensive. Besides negative impacts on individual users and those close to them, some suggest that pornography carries a major economic price: $16.9 billion a year in lost productivity.

Again, it’s impossible to know Ward’s true motivation, but even if she really did mean well, her philanthropic approach was greatly misguided. The nude photos probably pleased their recipients and the corresponding donations likely helped ease Australia’s pain, but Ward discarded basic decency while fueling the flames of a terrible social problem, which makes her work “Single-Minded Marketing.”

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Promotion in Disguise?

11/3/2019

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by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

Halloween was here and gone, but its effects live on. For kids, that may mean ongoing sugar rushes from a huge candy haul. For adults, it could be as serious as a DUI arrest after too much partying. However, one company you probably wouldn’t expect, stepped in to deter Halloween-related drunkenness.

It may come as a shock that the “King of Beers” created a unique Halloween-themed advertising campaign to discourage drinking. Budweiser, flagship brand of the iconic American beer company Anheuser-Busch, which is now a subsidiary of Belgium-based ABInBev, used the marketing firm David-Miami to develop some edgy Halloween-inspired ads to decrease drinking.

Budweiser’s promotion featured photos of several real people wearing Halloween costumes and funny looks on their faces. While there’s nothing unusual about pictures like that, especially around Halloween, what made these shots different was that they were mugshots. One of the photos, for instance, had a woman in a cat costume with black and white face-paint. Below her was the caption “Don’t let Halloween haunt you forever,” the Budweiser logo, and the tagline “Drink Wiser.”

In many ways, what Budweiser did was great. While alcohol is an important part of many people’s lives when socializing and celebrating, it’s also an addictive substance that when used in excess can wreak havoc on those using it and those who cross paths with them (e.g., physical and verbal abuse, drunk driving). Some call alcohol a drug and describe its use in the U.S. as an epidemic.

Still, it’s reasonable to ask the question: Does a company whose livelihood depends on beer sales really want people to drink less? There just aren’t many examples of organizations trying to decrease demand for their own products. The only two I can think of off-the-top are power companies asking residents to use less electricity during peak consumption times and casinos providing 800 numbers for those with gambling problems. I’m not sure the second example even qualifies.

Budweiser does, however, have a history of prodding people to ‘drink responsibly.’ Over 100 years ago, the company used the tagline “Budweiser Means Moderation,” and about 35 years ago the firm’s ads challenged consumers to “Know When to Say When.” The current “Drink Wiser” campaign, which kicked-off last year, urges customers to “hydrate between Buds.” Also, beers bought in certain locations between October 21 and November 1 on Drizly entitled drinkers to a $5 Lyft gift card “for a safe ride home.”

So, Budweiser has taken some steps to mitigate overindulgence, but do these measures really make a difference? In a 2008 study, Atkin, McCardle, and Newell found that consumers tended to perceive alcohol moderation advertisements as ambiguous and self-serving. Jones, Hall, and Kypril’s 2017 research produced similar findings: Consumers had difficulty interpreting many of the alcohol industry’s moderation messages.

The results of these studies and similar ones don’t bode well for alcohol moderation messages overall, but perhaps Budweiser’s “Drink Wiser” Halloween photo campaign was an exception. In lieu of research specific to the campaign, it may be helpful to dissect the ads and predict consumers’ likely response. So, here’s this marketer’s assessment of the campaign using communication's well-known AIDA model (attention, interest, desire, action):

The ads’ colorful and unusual photos of costumed people, probably grabbed viewers’ attention.
The curious-looking pictures likely also kept viewers’ interest, as they wondered why the bizarre subjects were posing for the camera and what they had to do with Budweiser, whose large logo was prominently displayed with the ad copy, i.e., more than just a small tag at the bottom.
The use of a humor appeal probably impacted viewer’s interpretations of the ads and ultimately their desire to accept the ads’ supposed call for drinking in moderation. The funny looking photos likely acted as “dissonant visuals,” serving to counteract the ads’ serious message. One might even say the comical pics made light of drunk driving.
What’s more, with the tagline “Drink Wiser” appearing just inches below the large Budweiser logo, it’s conceivable that consumers interpreted the ads’ call-to-action not to ‘drink smarter’ but simply to ‘drink Budweiser.’ In other words, people may have seen “Wiser” simply as an abbreviation for Budweiser, in the same way Pizza Hut is sometimes call “the Hut.”

So, were Budweiser’s Halloween-themed mugshot ads effective in deterring irresponsible drinking? I don’t know, but to the Gen Ys and Gen Zs to whom to the campaign most likely appealed, the ads probably just seemed like another application of the irreverent humor brands often try to use to attract young consumers to their products. In other words, the supposed deterrent actually may have acted more as a purchase stimulant.

It’s hard to judge motives—Did Budweiser really want to keep people from irresponsible alcohol consumption, or was it secretly banking on higher Halloween-holiday beer sales? We don’t know, but analysis of the ads makes it seem improbable that people were inspired to “drink wiser” as much as they were reminded to ‘drink Budweiser.’ As a result, the company’s likely misinterpreted mugshots are a snapshot of “Single-Minded Marketing.”

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Kidfluencers

10/5/2019

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by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

Do you remember doing ‘connect the dots’ as a kid? You probably liked seeing a picture appear as you drew lines from one number to the next. Today’s online influencer marketing makes it difficult even for adults to connect the dots between product users and corporate sponsors. Imagine how hard it is for kids, who some companies intentionally target, to put together a picture of that influence.

Influencer marketing, or influence marketing, “is a form of social media marketing involving endorsements and product placements from influencers, people and organizations who possess an expert level of knowledge and/or social influence in their respective fields.”

Although influencer marketing has been around for ages with celebrities (movie stars, TV personalities, famous athletes, etc.) endorsing products, it’s different now because social media have democratized the process. Now anyone with a significant following on Instagram or other popular platform can become a paid product ambassador.

One of the most popular influencers is a 7-year old named Ryan Kaji who has an astounding 32.3 billion views on his YouTube channel Ryan Toy Review. His 21.7 million subscribers ‘tune in’ to watch him unpack and play with a wide variety of toys provided by sponsors such as Hasbro and Walmart.

However, Ryan’s YouTube channel is just part of his ever-expanding commercial influence. His parents also record Ryan and his younger siblings’ visits to commercial tourist attractions, like Legoland California, for Ryan’s Family Review. In addition, Ryan stars in a Nickelodeon cable and online series called Ryan’s Mystery Playdate. Other signs of his great popularity are branded products, including a “a Ryan Kaji action figure, T-shirts and a plastic dinnerware set.”

Ryan Kaji is far from the only “Kidfluencer”; however, and he’s not close to the youngest. For instance, a four-year old named Samia has over 203,000 YouTube subscribers and 143,000 followers on Instagram, where she attracts paid promotions from HomeStyle Harvest chicken nuggets and Crayola, among other brands.

Then there’s Kyle Fisher’s two-year-old identical twins, Taytum and Oakley, who have over 2 million Instagram followers. Advertisers like Mattel pay between $10,000 and $20,000 to sponsor a single post featuring Fisher’s daughters.

Of course, children have long been cast in commercials, which many of us older adults remember when we were kids. Who can forget young actor Tommy Okon asking Pittsburgh Steeler Mean Joe Greene, “Do you want my Coke?” There are some important differences, however, with today’s Kidfluencers.

First, the Internet is still like the ‘Wild West’ in terms ‘lawlessness.’ Thanks to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), advertisers on television and radio must abide by rules that separate program content (the show) from commercial content (the ads) and that limit a character’s or program host’s use of promotions or product placement, but the Internet has no such restrictions.

So, there’s not much to stop the families of Kidfluencers from blurring the lines between programs and ads. Unlike when we watch traditional television that has distinct commercial breaks, online media often blend the two together such that influencers like Ryan Kaji are playing with and promoting sponsored products at the same time.

That blending leads to the second issue, mentioned above. Even adults can have a hard time distinguishing an unbiased product user from a paid endorser. Kids often have no concept that another child might only be playing with a toy online because his/her family received it for free or because they’re being paid to promote the product.

Children tend to take what they see and hear at face value. They’re unfamiliar with the notion of ulterior motives. As a result, kids can be easily misled.

I gained a sense of this vulnerability while teaching classes in Advertising Ethics for about a decade. Each year I was able to have my college students spend a little time talking with much younger students (sometimes just 4-6 years old) about advertising. Although the kindergarten-age kids could recognize almost any consumer-products brand from its logo, very few could explain what advertising was or why we had it.

Josh Golin, the executive director of the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, affirmed those observations by saying that it’s not until they’re 8 or 9 years old that most children recognize advertising. Similarly, in a complaint it filed against Ryan Toy Review, the nonprofit organization Truth in Advertising contended that preschoolers can’t differentiate an unbiased product review from a commercial.

Deception of young consumers isn’t the only potential ethical issue involving Kidfluencers. There’s the question of whether it’s right for parents to make their children promote products and whether such promotion constitutes work that might be subject to child labor laws.

But, back to the original issue: Although, Kidfluencers are very effective at ‘moving product,’ the deception used to accomplish those ends plays on the inexperience of some of society’s most vulnerable consumers--children. So, connecting the dots, the use of kids to influence the consumer behavior of other kids makes a picture of “Single-Minded Marketing.”

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Companies that Want to Make Us Mad

9/21/2019

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by Keith Quesenberry, Associate Professor of Marketing, Messiah College

Some people have a real knack for ‘pushing our buttons.’ They’re good at taking us to the point of frustration, then backing off just before we unravel. Now some companies are perfecting this tactic with the help of data analytics.

A friend recently shared with me his exasperation in dealing with one of the big Internet-TV-phone providers. For many months, his home Wi-Fi was having significant problems, which the provider finally sent a technician to fix, but only after many futile and often infuriating phone calls.

When the contract ended, my friend considered all his options, including giving the current provider a chance to keep his business. After several more frustrating phone calls, however, the best the provider would offer was a price about $20/month higher than he had been paying and than “new customers” could get.

So, he cancelled his account and switched to another company. Only then did the original provider call him with a competitive price and a plea, “Please come back to us,” but it was too late.

Unfortunately for it, the company passed the point of no return. Some other firms, however, have found how to step right up to that loss line without crossing it. Their secret is ‘big data.’

According to a recent Wall Street Journal (WSJ) article, certain companies now use data analytics and artificial intelligence (AI) to determine “how far a customer can be pushed until their heads explode.” The practice gauges how angry a customer can get right before they leave a business, then uses that knowledge to guide customer service and other marketing practices.

At first glance, such tactics may seem questionable, but could it be that these companies are on to something and consumers just need to consider ‘the bigger picture,’ beyond their immediate ire? Although these organizations might minimize customer support, maybe the cost savings and efficiencies they find will lead to lower prices or benefit customers in other ways.

Some question the ethics of AI, particularly whether it will take people’s jobs, but AI used properly can improve marketers’ performance and better serve customers. “How AI Can Improve Your Job Not Steal It” highlights these benefits, including the automation of time-consuming manual processes. Marketers also can use AI for data analysis, personalization, optimization, testing, digital asset management, automated campaigns and offers, content creation, and programmatic ad buying.

“How AT&T Uses Machine Learning to Better Serve Customers” describes how the communication giant uses AI in customer service to make predictions and provide intelligence to managers in near real-time that helps them answer questions like: “Were my customers happy or not?” “If I put them on hold did that make them unhappy?” and “Did my agent solve their problem the first time?”

In a recent post on AT&T’s technology blog, the firm explains how it’s using AI to improve experiences for customers, such as by building 5G, optimizing network traffic and speed, fighting robocalls, and making sure technicians arrive on time. AT&T adds that it uses AI to personalize customer interactions and “to enable friction-free, always available, customer powered problem-solving solutions.”

But, do systems that push consumers to the brink of breakdown solve problems or create them? In those tenuous cases, AT&T’s customers probably aren’t experiencing the standards set out in the firm’s AI Guiding Principles, which suggest that the technology should be: 1) By people, for people, 2) Accessible and shared, and 3) Secure and ethical.

These new analytics systems track things such as how long a customer will wait for a human to answer the phone and how many ads they will listen to before hanging up. AI can analyze behavior, personalities and tone of voice to determine what each person will tolerate. One expert, Mark Shaefer, author of Marketing Rebellion: The Most Human Company Wins, calls this use of AI “the worst marketing tactic ever.”

The WSJ shares a story similar to the unfortunate personal experience mentioned above. An AT&T customer had to make six calls and spend four hours on the phone to get the company to change her plan. Only when she asked to have her number transferred to Verizon did AT&T honor her original request.

So, what’s the bottom-line? Data analytics and AI certainly can make customer service more efficient and effective, which should mean better company performance and increased income that can benefit both shareholders and employees.

However, even if a company can ‘get away with it,’ using these tools to push people to anger isn’t strong support for societal values like fairness and respect. There’s enough anger in the world and angst in people’s lives. We don’t need companies intentionally adding more.

It’s great that more organizations are leveraging the latest technological trends to help power customer service, but using those tools to manage human emotions and manipulate people to madness should be seen as “Single-Minded Marketing.”

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Who's to Blame for Opioid Abuse?

9/8/2019

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by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

‘It’s hard to protect people from themselves.’ That saying resonates with everyone from EMTs who wish motorists would wear seatbelts, to parents who demand that their kids “Stop climbing on that!” So, who’s responsible when a significant portion of the population harms itself with prescription painkillers?

If you’ve been following the news, you’ve heard of America’s troubling opioid epidemic, which unfortunately has seen:

Misuse among 21-29% of those who are prescribed opioids for chronic pain
Use disorders in 8-12% of those who take the drugs
Transition to heroin for 4-6% of those who misuse prescription opioids
More than 130 people a day dying from opioid-related drug overdoses

What are opioids? They’re types of drugs that come naturally from the opium poppy plant that are often used to reduce pain. They also “can make some people feel relaxed, happy or ‘high,’ and can be addictive.”

The most common prescription opioids are Vicodin and OxyContin. Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid, “50 to 100 times more potent than morphine,” that’s often used to treat pain from advanced cancer. Then there’s heroin, “an illegal, highly addictive drug processed from morphine.

Recently, the name often heard in the same sentence as opioid epidemic is Purdue Pharma, the Stamford, Connecticut-based company that makes OxyContin, the brand name for oxycodone hydrochloride. The drug’s position at the center of the opioid crisis has made Purdue Pharma the focus of frequent legal scrutiny.

Used to “help relieve severe ongoing pain (such as due to cancer),” OxyContin should be a ‘medication of last resort.” In other words, if people suffering from very serious illness cannot find relief from anything else, OxyContin can be used to mitigate their pain.

Sufferers of significant, relentless pain, however, are not the ones driving the opioid epidemic. The problem stems, instead, from those who don’t need the drug but take it to get high and, if they don’t end up overdosing, often become addicted.

Should Purdue Pharma be accountable for this abuse by illegitimate users? More broadly, to what extent is any company culpable when consumers don’t use its products as intended. Are organizations responsible for protecting people from themselves?

Since the advent of mass-production, there have been continual examples of consumers injuring themselves by misusing products, often despite clear warnings from manufacturers, e.g., “Don’t stand on the top of this stepladder”; “Don’t put this plastic bag over your head.”

One of the most recent examples of widespread abuse was called the Tide Pod Challenge, which involved mainly teens videoing themselves chewing on the small detergent sacs and posting clips of their reactions on social media. Tragically, several people died as a result of ingesting the liquid.

Procter & Gamble (P&G), the maker of Tide, responded to its product’s misuse by offering advice on Twitter to those affected by the Challenge and by asking YouTube and Facebook to remove Tide Pod Challenge posts. P&G also produced a television commercial with former New England Patriots tight-end Rob Gronkowski urging viewers not to eat Tide Pods. All of these efforts were in addition to the company coating the Pods with a bitter-tasting substance in order to discourage children from biting into them.

P&G hasn’t stopped making Tide Pods, and as far as I know, the company hasn’t assumed responsibility for the Challenge-related injuries and fatalities. Is the firm wrong for failing to take those actions? No. The Tide Pod Challenge is an example of consumers' blatant product misuse, despite the company’s multifaceted, good-faith efforts to avoid it.

The same cannot be said, however, about Purdue Pharma and OxyContin. Here’s why the two cases of consumer abuse are very different:

In contrast to the Tide Pod Challenge, which was a short-lived ‘fad,’ Purdue Pharma knew for decades about OxyContin abuse but avoided addressing it. A New York Times piece details the timeline, beginning in the late 1990s, when the company concealed its knowledge that the medication was being stolen and sold illegally to abusers. Meanwhile, the firm promoted the exact opposite—that OxyContin was less prone to abuse than other prescription opioids.

Although serious, there never was an “epidemic” of Tide Pod misuse; cases were relatively isolated. As the earlier opioid statistics suggested, however, opioid abuse has been shockingly widespread. For instance, during the early 2000s, prescription drug distributors “sent enough pain pills to West Virginia over a five-year period to supply every man, woman and child there with 433 of them.”

Unlike Tide Pods, OxyContin is highly addictive. Probably no one who did the Tide Pod Challenge wanted to try it again, but those who start using OxyContin often can’t stop.

Despite the added exposure it brought the brand and the additional revenue it produced, all evidence supports that P&G did not want anyone eating Tide Pods. On the other hand, the New York Times suggests that Purdue Pharma, essentially encouraged abuse of its product by claiming that the company “planted the seeds of the opioid epidemic through its aggressive marketing of OxyContin.”

As I’ve read and heard about the opioid epidemic, I’ve wondered about the responsibility of doctors who liberally prescribed the drugs and of the consumers who misused the medication. I now understand that these persons share responsibility with at least one company that knowingly fueled the crisis. Purdue Pharma’s profiting from the nation’s opioid pain is a clear case of “Single-Minded Marketing.”

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Artificial Endorsers

7/26/2019

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by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

Have you ever thought you saw someone you knew, went to talk to them, but found it wasn’t them? That’s embarrassing. Or, have you ever thought ‘someone’ was a real person, only to realize they weren’t? This second kind of mistaken identity will become more common if one particular promotional trend continues.

In an age of artificial intelligence and deepfakes, it’s not surprising that some brands are promoting themselves using people who aren’t people. Enter “virtual influencers”—digitally-developed endorsers who plug products not because they like the brand and want the money but because they were programmed to promote.

Perhaps the best known virtual spokesperson is someone/thing named Miquela Sousa, or Lil Miquela. From the splattering of freckles across her youthful face to her complaints of cold temperatures outside, Miquela looks and acts like a real person; however, she’s actually an avatar, the creation of Brud, “a mysterious L.A.-based start-up of ‘engineers, storytellers, and dreamers’ who claim to specialize in artificial intelligence and robotics.”

The company crafted Miquela’s persona to be that of a “19-year-old Brazilian-American model, musical artist, and influencer” who appears to hang out in hip New York and Los Angeles locales, with real-life celebrities. The avatar’s carefully curated personal brand has made her alluring to millions of real-life fans, including more than 43,000 subscribers on YouTube and over 1.6 million followers on Instagram.

That large of a following also makes Miquela highly marketable, which, after all, is her reason for existence. Although, a computer generated influencer (CGI) can’t really use brands, she showcases ones such as Coach, Balenciaga, Ouai, and Proenza Schouler. The promotional potential of Miquela and her fellow avatars (e.g., Blawko) certainly is real, as further evidenced by Brud recently raising $6 million in venture capital and Time placing Miquela among its “25 Most Influential People on the Internet” along with the likes of Kayne West and Kylie Jenner.

But, potentially big fan-bases are not the only attractive attributes of virtual influencers compared to real ones. Digital beings don’t need to be paid. Contrast those zeros to the seven-year $75 million sneaker endorsement deal basketball phenom Zion Williamson just signed with Nike.

Virtual influencers also can be precisely controlled to do and say exactly what advertisers desire, ‘on- and off-camera.’ Contrast that certainty with the risk inherent with real human endorsers, such as Tiger Woods, whose 2009 sex scandal caused two of his biggest sponsors, Gatorade and AT&T, to bail.

There seems to be real value in using unreal influencers, but as this blog always suggests, just because marketers can, doesn’t necessarily mean that they should. So, the question: Is it ethical for organizations to employ virtual influencers?

The thought of “employment” raises an immediate concern: Will digital endorsers put real ones out of work? It seems that some displacement is inevitable: If Miquela is promoting Coach, the brand probably doesn’t need as many flesh-and-blood models or actors.

On the other hand, there are also now new jobs. Someone needs to create and manage the digital personas. So, an argument about unemployment can be countered by the age-old logic that people always need to adapt their job skills in order to keep pace with new technology and not be displaced by it: To stay employed, people who dug holes with shovels needed to learn to drive backhoes and bulldozers.

For what it’s worth, my prediction is that virtual influencers will proliferate to a point of saturation, after which the pendulum will swing back in the opposite direction, at least somewhat, as consumers reaffirm their appreciation for real people’s authenticity, genuineness, and unmanipulated humanity.

For me, the biggest ethical concern surrounding virtual influencers is the potential for deception. As consumers, it’s critical that we recognize when someone is sharing an objective, unbiased recommendation versus one with some corporate connection. There’s not necessarily anything wrong with paid endorsement, but consumers need to know when they’re experiencing it so they can raise their perceptual defenses and properly interpret the message.

For example, as a college professor, I often speak with prospective students and their families about their college choice. They expect me to describe my school in a positive light and understand that I can’t be completely objective. However, if in some social setting I happened to have a conversation with a family, without revealing my association, they might gain an unreasonably favorable impression of my school because they didn’t know that the institution I described was my employer.

For virtual influencers, the potential for deception is different in one way but very similar in another. For instance, when Prada used Miquela to promote its 2018 collection, people probably recognized the ads as corporate messages, not an average consumer’s unbiased recommendation. However, to the extent that viewers didn’t realize Miquela was 100% digital, they may have been deceived.

The reason is that there’s a reasonable expectation that endorsers, whether paid or unpaid, either use the product they’re promoting or have some special knowledge about it that makes them reliable sources of information. For example, I earned my bachelor’s degree from Messiah College and have taught there for nearly 20 years, which should give me some credibility as an endorser. It’s impossible, however, for a virtual influencer to use or otherwise experience the brands they advocate because virtual influencers are not real.

When we see a human endorser in an ad, we assume they’re getting paid, which lessens their perceived objectivity. Still, even if they’re like Zion Williamson and receiving a boatload of money for their support, it’s reasonable to think that they wouldn’t risk their reputation with a brand in which they didn’t believe. People who can command significant sponsorship dollars usually have various endorsement options and can choose reputable ones.

Although Miquela can be pictured wearing or holding Prada products, she can never experience them because she isn’t human. But, if people believe she is real, they can incorrectly assume that her actual interaction with the brand allows her to make sound judgments about it. In short, consumers can be deceived.

Some may be thinking, “But, virtual endorsers really aren’t new, so hasn’t the potential for deception existed for decades?”

It’s true that companies have been using various types of animated endorsers for a long time, e.g., the Pillsbury Dough Boy, Tony the Tiger, the Energizer Bunny. In the 1950s, Pepsodent created Susy Q, an original cartoon character, to promote its toothpaste. More recently, some companies are offering to create unique animated spokespeople that even small businesses can afford.

The difference is the technology used to create Miquela and similar virtual influencers is much more sophisticated, making it increasingly difficult for consumers to distinguish who’s human and who’s not. Therein, again, lies the problem.

When we can tell that animated brand ambassadors aren’t real, we’re under no illusion that they use the products. However, when we believe a spokesperson is human, we assume that they use the product or have some special knowledge about it, which may give us unwarranted confidence in their recommendation.

It’s fine for organizations to use animated beings to promote their products, but they should be careful not to mislead consumers by making the influencers so real that they seem human when they’re not. That kind of deception may sell products but it is really “Single-Minded Marketing.”

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What Does "Meat" Mean?

6/1/2019

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by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

Girl Scout: “Is this [lemonade] made from real lemons?”

Wednesday and Pugsley, seated at their lemonade stand: “Yes.”

Girl Scout: “I’ll buy a cup, if you buy a box of my delicious Girl Scout cookies.”

Wednesday: “Are they made from real Girl Scouts?”

This dark humor from the 1991 comedy movie The Addams Family may scare up a few laughs, but it’s actually a good example of the product name debate that has many people asking, “Does a burger have to be meat?” and “What makes milk, milk?”

Hamburgers are to blame for the most recent round of debate. A few weeks ago, Burger King started testing a “meatless Whopper,” a vegetable-based patty that contains heme, “a protein cultivated from soybean roots that mimics the texture of meat.”

Veggie burgers have been around for a long time, but thanks to business partner Impossible Foods, founded in 2011 by Stanford biochemistry professor Patrick Brown, the newest generation of vegetable patties not only taste much more like meat, they even bleed like beef.

Burger King isn’t the only fast food chain seeing potential in a plant-based future. McDonald’s has started selling a McVegan burger and vegan McNuggets in Europe, Del Taco will begin to offer meatless tacos, and White Castle and Red Robin are already serving meatless burgers.

For years, nutritionists have been telling us to eat less meat and more vegetables, so what’s not to like about the growing selection of ‘plant food’? The concern is that the new nomenclature, like the word meatless, confuses consumers.

For instance, Nebraska’s farm groups have lobbied for a more restrictive use of the word meat: “any edible portion of any livestock or poultry, carcass, or part thereof.” As one of the nation’s leaders in commercial red meat production, the state has a real “steak” in ensuring that consumers do not migrate away from ‘real’ meat.

Last October, Missouri became the first state to legislate that anything that doesn’t come from “harvested production livestock or poultry” cannot be called meat. That goes for lab-grown meat, like Finless Foods is creating by taking cells of dead fish, putting them in pretri dishes, and cultivating their division into edible protein.

The dairy industry has faced similar and even more far-reaching name-related challenges. For about the last two decades, producers of traditional cow’s milk have witnessed a surge in competition from the likes of almond, cashew, hemp, oat, rice, and soy “milk.” According to Mintel, dairy milk sales declined by 15% from 2012 to 2017, all while non-dairy milk sales increased by more than 60%, with almond milk grabbing a 64% share of the market.

It was in this context that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Scott Gottlieb remarked that almond milk shouldn’t be called milk since “an almond does not lactate.” Shortly thereafter, the FDA opened a public comment period, inviting consumers and industry members to share their opinions on the milk-naming debate.

The FDA is justified in asking whether there’s been slippage in the “standards of identity” that ensure consumers understand exactly what they’re purchasing. That’s its job. However, the agency would do well to look back much further than the last 20 years, for instance, to 1626 when Francis Bacon observed that certain plants “have milk in them when they are cut.” Likewise, in the late 1700s, the Encyclopedia Britannica published that “the emulsive liquors of vegetables may be called vegetable milks.”

The fact is, people have been using the word milk to refer to similar-looking white liquids for centuries, if not much longer, from a wide variety of sources. Consider, for instance, milk from coconuts, as well as milk from other animals like goats and camels. Indeed, “nondairy milks [have] abounded in many other cultures across the globe.”

Furthermore, meat and milk are far from the only names that have been extended to describe a broader range of products. Take another common dairy product—butter. Peanut butter is entirely plant-based (no dairy), yet the FDA carved out an exception because the product's creamy texture resembles butter and because few people would be eager to purchase “peanut paste.”

It’s not to say that anything goes, i.e., that industries and companies can feel free to call their products whatever they’d like. However, names needn’t be limited to one narrow product category, provided that they serve at least one of the following legitimate functions:

Identify who makes or sells the product, e.g., Avocados from Mexico, Starbuck’s
State for whom the product is intended, e.g., Children’s Tylenol, Dove for Men
Describe what’s in the product, e.g., wheat bread, whole grain pasta
Identify key product features and/or benefits, e.g., fat-free yogurt, Sketcher’s Relaxed Fit
Describe the product’s consistency, e.g., chunky peanut butter; Silk Soy Milk
State the product’s intended use, e.g., Hamburger Helper; Liquid Plumber

Most importantly, neither the product category name nor the brand name should mislead a reasonable consumer. The labels listed above probably aren’t confusing to you or the vast majority of people who read them because marketers and our culture in general have done good jobs educating us about the words’ meanings

So, most Americans know “meatless” means a product does not contain meat. Likewise, as attorney Justin Person has said, “If a consumer is confused about the source of a product labeled ‘almond milk,’ then he has bigger problems than being confused about which milk to buy.” Reasonable people also know that Girl Scout cookies don’t contain Girl Scouts.

It’s not surprising that the beef and dairy industries want to preserve exclusivity for their product category names. However, given that consumers aren’t confused by broader-based naming and may even be helped by it, it looks like the two industries are doing little more than protecting their own livelihoods, which makes their name-related lobbying “Single-Minded Marketing.”

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Divine Humor

4/19/2019

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by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

On March 15, a gunman killed 50 people at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand. During two weeks in late March and early April, a suspect set fire to three churches in Louisiana. While most people denounce such religious violence, some seem to suggest, ‘If only people would lighten up and not take faith so seriously, there wouldn’t be such incidents.’ Perhaps that reasoning was behind a television series that gets a laugh over God.

Based on Simon Rich’s book “What in God’s Name,” Miracle Workers tells the story of two low-level angels, Craig and Eliza, who try to save humanity from God, who has grown “frustrated with the current state of Earth.” The seven-episode TBS series, which aired this past February and March and is still available for streaming online, summoned considerable star power, namely Daniel Radcliffe of Harry Potter fame, who plays an angel named Craig, and Golden Globe winner Steven Buscemi, who plays God and who has appeared in a wide variety of TV shows and films, including Fargo and Reservoir Dogs.

At first glance, the premise of Miracle Workers seems like it could be biblical. Those familiar with the book of Exodus may recall an exchange between God and Moses after he returned from Mount Sinai with the Ten Commandments to find the Israelites worshipping a golden calf. Ironically, the first and second commandments on the stone tablets were “You shall have no other gods before me” and “You shall make no idols.” God wanted to “destroy” the Israelites and make Moses into a great nation, but Moses seemingly convinced God to relent, and the Israelites were spared.

Compared to the gravity of that scriptural account, Miracle Workers casts God and religion in a much less serious light. Admittedly, I’ve only seen the trailer, watched some online segments of the show, and read reviews, but it quickly becomes apparent that the series presents a less-than-complimentary perspective of the Divine.

For instance, in just the first few minutes of episode #1, the series shows God dressed in sweatpants, an unbuttoned shirt, and sandals with socks, lounging purposelessly on a couch, as he scrolls through TV channels. Suddenly, an assistant appears to call him to a 1:00 meeting, which he hopes is for a “fantasy football draft,” but she reminds him he is to present his “plan to end all pain.” He obviously isn’t ready, by virtue of his response, “That was today?”

Fast forward in the show, and an even more unkempt-looking God finishes swigging a beer, wipes his mouth with his hand, and launches the empty bottle through the air toward a small round trashcan. The bottle misses the basket and shatters on the floor, leading him to let loose an expletive. In another episode, assistants find God brushing his teeth with foot cream, apparently because he can’t read the labeling on the tube.

As tensions related to religion rise around the world, maybe Buscemi’s portrayal of God is what’s needed: a deity who’s more approachable—one we can relate to and laugh about. After all, “laughter is the best medicine.”

Interestingly, I’m currently working with two colleagues on a research project that’s investigating how advertising humor might support reconciliation. I’m a big believer that laughter goes a long way in breaking down social barriers and developing interpersonal rapport. I’m also a big proponent of humor in the classroom, which students seem to appreciate.

Of course, there’s a difference between laughing with people and laughing at them. There’s also a difference between good-natured, two-way teasing in which people playfully pick on each other, and one-way, vicious skewering of others.

For instance, if a friend shows up at an event with his hair wildly wind-blown, others might joke, “Joe, did you just wake up?” People actually appreciate that kind of benign ribbing because it shows they’re liked and considered part of the group. On the other hand, few would think it’s funny to say, “Don’t be an idiot, Joe. Wear a hat next time or the wind will blow away the little hair you have left.” The latter “humor” feels much less friendly and more malicious.

As the earlier examples suggest, the humor in Miracle Workers makes God out to be a bumbling buffoon, i.e., an idiot. But, does it matter? God is big; He can take it. That’s true. He certainly doesn’t need human approval to build His self-esteem or validate his existence. The problem, however, is in how people perceive the show’s humor.

So, what do viewers think of Miracle Workers’ unconventional comedy? Some people love the show. For instance, one reviewer said, “This by far, is the funniest comedy I have ever seen. I cannot wait to watch more.” Another offered similar praise, “I think this is a creative and fantastic TV show which will be one of the greatest sitcoms.”

Other opinions are more tempered, for example: “The comedy was pretty decent but nothing I'd consider really, really funny.”

Then, there were those who saw a comedic catastrophe: “I was hoping the show would be better than the promos. It wasn’t. It felt like a high school play. The writing was bad without one good joke. It needs help from God. A miracle.” Another offered a similar critique, “This show is not even remotely funny. It borders on pathetic.”

The preceding perspectives were solely about the show’s humor. How did people perceive the comedic portrayal of God? As might be expected, some took exception to the divine representation saying, for instance, “I don't like that God is portrayed as a maniacal sociopath who manipulates angels into doing horrible things to people on Earth whom he decides he doesn't like,” and “[I] don't like God being portrayed as a slovenly, self-centered maniac,” and “Our God is perfect in All Ways. This show portrays God as being a bumbling idiot unable to make a decision . . . Nothing but blasphemy.”

However, others were quick to discount such ‘biased’ interpretations, many making the same plea to not take the series too seriously because “It’s just a TV show.”

That is a good point. Miracle Workers isn’t part of the K-12 public school curriculum. Still, is it fair to dismiss anything as “just a ____” until we see its impact? When it aired, Alex Haley’s Roots was “just a TV show,” but it had indelible social influence.

Of course, Miracle Workers is a comedy, not a critically-acclaimed drama, so does that mean its cultural impact isn’t serious? Probably not—just look at sitcoms over the years that have helped shape society like All in the Family, The Jeffersons, and The Cosby Show, to name a few.

So, if TV shows, even sitcoms, have social impact, a final question seems to be: Is any topic fair for them to ridicule? People increasingly agree that it’s wrong to tease people about things like their race, their gender, and their body shape/size. Beliefs, however, appear to be held to a different standard, and perhaps they should. We are born as a certain race and gender, whereas our beliefs are things we choose and can more readily change.

However, not all beliefs are equal. For instance, I’m a big Pittsburgh Steelers fan, but I don’t mind getting teased about that team loyalty, or about my beliefs about my field—marketing. I should also be able to take teasing about my Christian faith, as others have endured far worse.

It’s different, though, when the butt of the joke isn’t me, but God. It’s hard to explain why other than, for a person of faith, God is ‘the ultimate’ and therefore deserving of the utmost respect. There’s also probably a connection to the third of the Ten Commandments, “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain,” which any unflattering or derogatory portrayal of God seems to violate.

The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution protects free speech, which allows Miracle Workers to lampoon God. However, just because an organization or an individual has a right to do something doesn’t mean that they should.

I once heard a joke about a man who wanted to know if there would be golf in heaven. Sometime later, I remembered the joke and told it to two Christians I was with at the time. The joke didn’t make fun of God, but one of the people kindly expressed that he didn’t think any humor involving God was appropriate. The other individual defended my choice.

Although I still believe the joke is fine, I appreciate that first person’s beliefs and wouldn’t want to cause him angst by using similar humor around him. A little laughter is not that important. Sometimes the best thing to do is to not exercise our rights, out of respect for others.

When it comes to not caring for the humor in Miracle Workers, I know I’m in the minority. More people like the show and don’t take issue with it taunting God. So, the series seems to be a success, and it will likely continue to attract viewers online and perhaps continue into a second season. However, the show’s insensitivity toward one of many people’s most strongly held beliefs makes Miracle Workers “Single-Minded Marketing.”