When Marketing Goes Bad. Shock Tactics – Should You Use Them?

Shock tactics in advertising are nothing new. Based on the premise that ‘no publicity is bad publicity’, brands like Benetton (new-born baby billboards), French Connection (FCUK), and the Government’s anti drunk-driving TV campaigns have worked hard to make the public look twice, and maybe even wince a bit.

Recently, this article in The Guardian caught my eye. In the USA several TV networks refused to show a Kotex advert that used anatomical terms. This is a contrast to the UK-based Mooncup online campaign, which is much more frank – whilst also being quite funny.

What both Kotex and Mooncup are successfully doing is starting a debate, and if “your brand is what people say about you when you’re not in the room” (Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon.com), both these companies are increasing their brand equity by getting people talking.

The question here though is, what is shocking and what is merely surprising? Well, I think it depends on who your target market is (and no it’s not ‘everybody’, so don’t give me that!).

What is the most shocking marketing campaign you’ve ever seen?

My tip: Test your tactics

It’s always, always, ALWAYS a good idea to test a marketing campaign before you roll it out. However, if you’re thinking of using shock tactics it’s absolutely vital!

Shock tactics are a risky business. Sometimes the results are amazing, sometimes they’re dire and can effectively kill a company (remember Gerald Ratner’s faux pas to his shareholders?).

This doesn’t mean that you can’t use shock tactics, it just means you need to test the campaign first on a cross-section of your market. This means picking a few clients, and asking them what they think. Try to get people of varying ages, different genders, backgrounds… …you get the idea.

If they give you the response you want (and you’d better know beforehand what response you’re looking for), that’s brilliant and you can look at rolling the campaign out. However, if your best customer tells you that they never want to hear from you again, that’s a good sign that you’ve missed your target – and badly.

So in short, if you want to shock, make sure that your tactics have the desired results before you roll them out across your entire marketing platform.