How do you feel about “we care” COVID advertisements?
How do you feel about the way brands are making ads for a COVID-19 world? I’ve seen the words “we are all in this together” at least 800 times in the last week. Something has been bothering me about this and I can’t decide if it’s icky, genuine or just smart marketing.
Here’s a supercut of examples that show how similar they are:
And an example from a website:
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Comments (11)
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SeaBee - May 13, 2020
Great question. Our (former?) economy was built on consumer consumption, so there’s no doubt these companies care about mitigating/eradicating COVID and hastening a return normalcy (read: sales). Does that feel icky? Not to me, but I’m not expecting BMW or the rest to genuinely care about consumers beyond point of sale and repeated purchases. Cynical? Maybe, but it also begs a question about what kind of economy we’d like to have on the other side of this, perhaps one not predicated on maximizing shareholder value.
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JB - May 13, 2020
They really bother me. On the one hand I guess it’s a good thing that companies understand people are struggling instead of being all peachy or not offering better payment programs. But it just all comes across as fake and makes me angry.
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Dragoon - May 13, 2020
This is why I like Netflix lol. I haven’t seen alot of them but I went through the video and wow. They have to know that people are smart enough to know what they’re doing right? Most people anyway. Where was all that togetherness when things weren’t bad? And some of them are laying people off anyway.
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John AdamaStaff - May 13, 2020
I just watched the supercut again and the road curve in the Nissan part looks almost identical to the BWM road curve in the OP above:
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Olly Wright - May 13, 2020
If companies actually cared about people, they wouldn’t be such bad corporate citizens and would’ve been better prepared for something like this to begin with, such as PPE for their workers or even some cash reserves so they didn’t become insolvent so quickly. It amazes me that massive companies don’t have a few weeks of working cash on hand, then turn around and say “oh, we’ll get through these hard times together” while they get massive bailouts and we get $1,200.
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Ef Rodriguez - May 14, 2020
It’s basically the same as all the emails I’ve been getting from the same companies. Like every company I have ever bought anything from. Ever. And they all the same thing. I almost wanted to save some of them so I could forward them later if get a random late fee or unnecessary baggage fee, in the case of airlines. “I thought we were homies!” I sound petty. Argh.
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pint of beer - May 14, 2020
i feel like some have been handling it better than others in the fact that the messaging has to be backed up by action. you see some major companies giving what feels like lip service while others are making specific ways to help people. those are the things that work. words backed up by actions, otherwise it’s more “hopes and prayers”
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Mary Ellen Feinberg - May 22, 2020
If they really want to convince us of their humanitarian warmth and fuzziness, they should start by convincing us that they treat their own employees as “family” in “these unprecedented times.” That would make more of an impression.
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Matt Black - May 23, 2020
Exactly. Demonstrate how much you care about people by protecting your employees and consumers.
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Matt Black - May 23, 2020
Honestly, they’re just another tactic to keep their brand at top-of-mind. They all just ring hollow for me.
There’s also the fact that there were a lot of multi-million dollar companies that snatched-up bailout money intended for small business, mom-n-pop shops. Not very “we’re all in this together” as far as I’m concerned.
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Conrad B - May 25, 2020
You’re right about the bailout money thing. I don’t know if the bigger companies will face any kind of reckoning over that or not. I kinda think not. A few of them gave the money back, like Ruths Chris steakhouse but most of them, no chance.
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