Here’s a study by Abodo.com called “Tolerance In America” which researched 12 million tweets with obscene language in the US and ranked them state by state:
controversial branding
Here’s an instance of a controversial topic, but that topic is so b2b email list faq unimportant that no one would really be offended by it.
In a “debatable” type of controversy, it’s hard to see a brand’s image being harmed.
But with the second type of controversy (“shocking/taboo”), you may not be sure whether your brand will create a positive or negative impact on the minds of a majority of your supporters.
Here is the world famous controversial campaign of “Kissing Nun” by United Colors of Benetton:
Fortunately for United Colors, this campaign made them world famous.
The idea was that their brand could “unite” strongly contrasting opposites with acceptance of multiculturalism, difference, and a sense of equality. It wanted to remove the message of the “sanctity of religion” and replace it with a message of “universal love”.
But these social taboos are very dangerous when creating brand campaigns. While they have the power to catapult a brand into the limelight, they can also drastically hurt a brand’s image.
Let’s look at some examples where the latter happened…
