Getting your marketing wrong has always triggered the risk of legal action resulting in fines or other penalties but, in the digital age, the stakes for advertisers are even higher.
Social media users scrutinise ads and frequently call out corporates who may not have violated the law but who have clearly “misread the room”, causing avoidable reputational harm.
Take the recent example of Citroen’s campaign in Egypt.
BBC News reported that Citroën withdrew a commercial in Egypt featuring the pop star Amr Diab that social media users accused of normalising sexual harassment. In the film, Diab uses his car's camera to photograph a woman crossing the road, apparently without her consent.
They are later seen driving together. This, in a country where 99.3% of girls and women reported experiencing some form of sexual harassment in their lifetime. The French carmaker said it did not tolerate any form of harassment and apologised to all those offended. (BBC News December 31, 2021).
Certain more controversial and highly regulated industries - tobacco, alcohol and gambling for example - are under even greater scrutiny including from groups opposed to their very existence. Because the products concerned are intended for adults, the marketing risks for these producers are more acute and include reaching inappropriate audiences, such as children.
Making the wrong call on marketing content and reach for these corporations can have long lasting effects and negatively impact their efforts at societal and regulatory engagement. Careful attention to the relevant laws and Codes is necessary but insufficient for these sectors. Self-regulation in the form of Marketing Codes which set enforceable internal standards in the form of which “regulate” content and placement are an important risk mitigation tools but fundamentally it’s critical to ask not only “can we?” but “should we?” before green lighting any campaign.
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