Kendall + Pepsi = Fail

Pepsi's recent campaign which featured across Facebook, Instagram and normal advertising channels showed Kendall Jenner subdue protest tensions by offering a police officer a can of Pepsi. 

Pepsi sought to depict the brand as a cultural unifying force but received a lot of backlash in the media and many people criticized the messaging strategy present in the ad. 

Twitter users were quick to point out that Pepsi's ad appropriated imagery from social justice movements like Black Lives Matter without concretely outlining its own real-world issues to tackle, making the entire effort look cynical. 

The tone-deafness here was attributed by some to the ad being made by an in-house shop which spurred larger discussions about the lack of perspective in-house creative work can produce and the value of third-party agencies. 

Brand messaging that gets political without looking to make a social good investment or fitting it into the larger brand story is likely to be rejected. A recent report from industry group 4A's found that 58% of consumers don’t want politics in their marketing at all, and widespread criticism of a push like Pepsi's speaks to that skepticism and the fine balance that must be struck.

Speaking to the Heart

Sometimes great advertising goes beyond branding and speaks to the heart of people’s needs, fears, hopes and dreams. 

Procter & Gamble’s “My Black Is Beautiful” campaign showed that if a advertisement touches the viewers heart, they are more likely to talk about it and create conversation on social media.

The two-minute #TalkAboutBias commercial called on consumers to discuss and end racial bias. Throughout the emotional clip, we see African-American mothers teaching their children to believe in themselves despite prejudice.

P&G’s #TalkAboutBias spot has garnered nearly 1 million views, 16,000 reactions, 19,000 shares and 4,000 comments since its Facebook debut in late July. On YouTube, the commercial spawned a number of reaction videos, and the #TalkAboutBias hashtag trended on Twitter.

That’s one well-executed campaign. But many marketers become so consumed with the functionality of social platforms that they forget that social is simply an enabler. Analytics features help them share in targeted, automated ways. However, social tools are only as effective as the content you create. 

P&G’s campaign works because it speaks to an ongoing concern in American society by empathizing with the afflicted and reaching for viewers’ heartstrings. In today’s data-driven marketing environment, social advertisers often become so fixated on the numbers and analytics that they forget they’re talking to fellow humans. However, emotions drive 80 percent of people’s decisions. 

Stats alone will not help brands reach their audiences in meaningful ways. In fact, the combination of people-centric messaging with consumer analytics has the potential to drive a new era of emotionally resonant, high-performing ads.