Procter & Gamble’s “foot smell” big move is too smelly

Text/Yangcheng Evening News commentator Lin Rumin

On March 24, the keyword “Procter & Gamble apologizes” Top search on Weibo. The cause of the incident was that on March 13, Procter & Gamble published an article on its official account titled “Women’s foot odor is 5 times that of men? Do not believe it, smell it now”, accused of insulting women. At noon on the 24th, P&G publicly apologized on its official Weibo.

Famous brands, women, foot odor, instant smell, these words are enough to constitute a suspenseful thriller peach sex drama, of course, it is eye-catching enough to want to come This is also the basic idea of ​​copywriters.

This hot search also has room for further comments. So if we want to criticize, what angle should we start from? Insulting women and disrespecting women are of course the most mainstream and correct perspective, and in fact it is. The article aroused public outrage, precisely because of the derogation of women without scientific basis, and P&G could only proceed from the “disrespect for women” and express a “solemn apology”.

A common technique for some new media tweets is to start a headline full of misinformation or specious to attract attention, and then introduce it in the text the correct information. Procter & Gamble was deeply poisoned by this method, but it was obviously not in the realm of transformation, and the poison gas attacked the heart. Others were loose on the outside and tight on the inside, but Procter & Gamble was loose on the inside and outside.

In addition, in addition to being accused of lack of sincerity, as a well-known brand, writing a copywriting is so sluggish, which also makes people feel bad about the company. The so-called corporate culture is suspicious. For example, “We solemnly apologize for the disrespect to women caused by the inappropriate content of a recent article on the P&G member center account”, how to read and how to screw up.

Traditional advertising and marketing, no matter what product is sold, likes to be accompanied by the image of a sexy beauty, and the desire to have a beautiful woman motivates people to buy the product. “Besides sometimes promoting the inherent qualities of an object, the metaphor of sexiness and possession of another kind of object constitutes the only basis for advertising” (History of Integrity). Although this is also a marketing model worthy of criticism, but only worse, not the worst, at least it is more pleasing to the eye than P&G’s “foot odor”.

In a word, this “foot odor” incident, its values, copywriting, and marketing methods are extremely smelly.

Editor: Wang Yu

[Source: Jin Yangwang]

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