Future Network Beijing, April 9 (Reporter Ling Meng) Less than half a month after the Weilong spicy strip packaging copy "overturning" incident, another brand was "planted" on vulgar advertising.
According to Tianyan, the Shenzhen branch of Shanghai Targeted Advertising And Communication Co., Ltd. was fined 500,000 yuan by the regulatory authorities and confiscated illegal gains for publishing vulgar advertisements. It is reported that the company once released an advertising slogan called "No sapphire, I don't take off" for the hair removal device brand Ulike, which triggered a hot discussion in public opinion.
It is worth noting that a week ago, the Weilong brand just apologized for the "pornography" on the product packaging. Previously, Procter & Gamble and Coconut Tree Group have also "flipped" in vulgar marketing. Why are these consumer brands keen on eye-catching "edge-wiping" advertising?
Vulgar ads reappear! Ulike epilatator advertisers were fined $500,000
"No sapphires, I don't take off".
The publisher of this eye-catching slogan was recently imposed administrative penalties by the regulatory authorities. According to the administrative penalty letter published by the Tianyancha platform, on April 6, the Shenzhen branch of Shanghai Targeted Advertising Communication Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Shanghai Orienteering") was fined 500,000 yuan by the Shenzhen Municipal Market Supervision and Administration Bureau for advertising violations, and confiscated the illegal gains.
(Image source: Tianyancha)
The reporter learned from Tianyancha that Shanghai Targeted was established in 2003 and is an advertising company focusing on advertising design, production, agency and release.
According to previous media reports, in March this year, the vulgar advertisements released by Shanghai for the hair removal device brand Ulike frequently appeared in many residential quarters, commercial building elevators and lobbies in Shenzhen, which aroused the attention of many citizens.
In the advertising poster, the words "I do not take off" are also boldly enlarged, which is very conspicuous, and the smallest font size is the product feature of the hair removal device. "Why should the old and young in the elevator be embarrassed?" Aren't you on the verge of breaking the law? The Shenzhen market supervision WeChat public account has issued a statement on this matter.
(Source: Shenzhen market supervision WeChat public account)
The reporter noted that the Shenzhen market supervision pointed out in the article that the advertising slogan of the hair removal device "no sapphire, I do not take off" is suspected of violating the provisions of Article 9, Item 7 of the Advertising Law, "Advertisements shall not obstruct social public order or violate good social customs".
At the same time, it is also suspected of violating the second paragraph of article 42 of the Law on the Protection of Women's Rights and Interests, which stipulates that "it is forbidden to demean and harm women's personality through mass media or other means." ”
After the incident fermented on the Internet, on March 3, the customer service of the official flagship store of Ulike told the media that there were notes explained in the lower left corner of the original advertisement, and the "I do not take off" in the advertising word has been changed to "I do not remove hair".
After inquiring, the future network reporter learned that the Ulike brand has a high reputation in the hair removal device products, and the number of fans on an e-commerce platform is as high as 2.43 million. Previously, the brand had also released advertising slogans such as "high-end women's high-end" and "sales are far ahead for 5 consecutive years".
In this regard, Xia Hailong, a lawyer at Shanghai Shenlun Law Firm, pointed out in an interview with the media that "the advertisement of Ulike hair removal device products does not meet the requirements of simple and high-frequency repetition of the word 'advanced' without a specific and objective introduction to the product." In addition, the phrase 'senior women' in the slogan also implies discrimination against women's grading. ”
Playing "soft pornography" to rub the edge ball and insult women, these brands frequently "overturn"
A week before Ulike's "storm", the Weilong brand had set off a hot discussion of vulgar advertising on the Internet.
On March 26, Weilong was questioned by netizens about "vulgarity" and "playing edge balls" because the outer packaging of its spicy noodle products was printed with words such as "about it", "thief big" and "tough".
(Image source: @The Paper)
A few days later, Weilong issued an apology statement through the official Weibo, saying that it decided to stop the production of controversial copywriting packaging and optimize the layout copywriting and design. According to the customer service response of Weilong Food flagship store, the Market Supervision Bureau of Luohe City, Henan Province, has intervened in the investigation of the incident, and Weilong will actively cooperate with the relevant departments to investigate and verify.
On April 7, the reporter of the Future Network sent an interview letter to Luohe Weilong Commercial and Trade Co., Ltd. and the Propaganda Department of the Luohe Municipal Party Committee of the Communist Party of China on the progress of the investigation of Weilong's vulgar advertising incident, but as of press time, no response from both sides had been received.
Weilong, known as the "spicy brother", can also be called the leader in the industry in marketing.
As early as 2016, Weilong was exposed to the release of advertising slogans such as "Little brother, eat tofu", "more brine, easy to blur things to see", "foot control welfare" and other advertising slogans in the official flagship store of Tmall, which were questioned as vulgar marketing. At that time, many netizens joked that they "suspected that they had clicked on the wrong WEBSITE."
Also known as the "marketing veteran" is the Coconut Tree Group in the field of FMCG.
In 2019, when the coconut tree brand replaced the new packaging of its coconut milk products, it chose the "big breast beauty" style promotional image, and matched it with the advertising slogan of "I drank from small to large", which was questioned by many consumers. Subsequently, the Coconut Tree Group was fined 200,000 yuan for obstructing social public order and violating good social customs.
After this storm, Coconut Tree Group did not stop the pace of marketing. In March 2021, Coconut Tree Group published a recruitment advertisement on its official Weibo that reads, "There is a car, a house, a high salary, and a beautiful and handsome man chasing after school", which caused social controversy. Subsequently, Coconut Tree Group was also fined 400,000 yuan by the regulatory authorities for the same reason of obstruction of social public order and violation of good social customs.
In addition, the automobile brand Changan Ford and the daily chemical brand Procter & Gamble have also been questioned for suspected vulgar marketing.
In May 2021, Changan Ford posted a video measuring the speed of the car on the official Weibo, with the caption "Is it true that in Japanese anime, boys run at high speed and lift girls' skirts?" Today's white dress fluttering sister to help, reproducing the classic scene of Japanese comics! The vulgar pictures and text caused strong dissatisfaction among netizens.
Subsequently, @Changan Ford responded to the matter by saying that it had immediately deleted the published content and sincerely apologized, "We must not take it as an example and strictly abide by the correct concept of online content." ”
(Image source: @Nine Pie News)
Coincidentally, in March this year, Procter & Gamble published an article titled "Women's Feet Stink 5 Times That Of Men, Don't Believe It!" The article mentioned that "women's foot odor is 5 times that of men" and "women also have body odor, and the most smelly chest" and other controversial content, which was questioned by netizens as "insulting women".
Behind the frequent appearance of vulgar marketing, why do brands love the "Bo eyeball" style out of the circle?
In the era of traffic, whether it is product promotion or brand image shaping, it is inseparable from marketing. But why are some brands so "partial" to "edge ball" style vulgar marketing?
Zhang Li, director of the medical and health law department of Zhejiang Jingheng (Ningbo) Law Firm, pointed out in an interview with the future network reporter that the main reason for the existence of vulgar advertising is that some brands want to attract attention with the help of marketing and get out of place. "Where there is a topic, there will be attention, and the greater the controversy, the higher the attention." As the saying goes, 'black and red is also red'. ”
Chen Xiaodou, a civil administrative lawyer consulting expert of the Supreme People's Procuratorate and a member of the Intellectual Property Committee of the Shanghai Lawyers Association, agreed with the above views, and she told the Future Network reporter that the frequent appearance of vulgar advertisements is mainly related to the values of some brands. "Some brands blindly pursue 'individuality' and mistake vulgarity for personality; others, taking advantage of the curiosity of minors, they usually not only do not guard but also blindly follow the trend."
In the eyes of industry insiders, the illegal cost of vulgar marketing is low and there is no clear definition, or one of the reasons why these brands are keen to play "edge ball".
"The current law really can't define which kind of behavior is vulgar, which brings 'troubles' to advertising law enforcement." Kong Lei, a lawyer at Beijing TEO Law Firm, pointed out in an interview with the media.
He suggested that the relevant administrative departments could regularly issue specific cases listing what bad publicity was. "From the perspective of judicial practice, interpreting the law by case will make the boundaries of vulgarity and pornography in advertisements more clear, and can timely and effectively alleviate and make up for the pressure and deficiencies in law revision."
However, it should be noted that while brands want to go out of the circle with vulgar advertising, they also need to bear the risk of damage to reputation and influence. The "rollover" incident of the above-mentioned brand in vulgar advertising has also proved many times that consumers do not buy such "publicity methods", and the final effect is counterproductive.
It is true that the way the brand goes out of the circle is not only vulgar marketing, the key to choosing "black and red" or "red" lies in the brand itself.
As the Beijing Youth Daily previously published a commentary said, taking vulgarity as creativity, pornography as a selling point, taking crooked roads as shortcuts, walking on the edge of morality and law, sooner or later it will be "overturned" in public. Even if you earn traffic for a while, you will eventually end up with "success and traffic, defeat and traffic".