Feb 7, 2021
Robinhood’s Next Move, Launching Mega Super Bowl Ad
Well, it’s Super Bowl day!
As we are aware, Robinhood restricted trading in shares of companies such as GameStop (NYSE: GME), BlackBerry (NYSE: BB), and more. We know the outbreak this caused, so safe to say Robinhood is going to hide under the shadows? Guess again, they’re launching their first Super Bowl advertisement in the midst of all this.
“You don’t need to become an investor. You were born one.” The message Robinhood has decided to start things off with. Perhaps this uplifting message will cool down some of the frustrated day-traders who set foot to take legal action on Robinhood, after they restricted trading in the above mentioned shares. Or…. maybe not.
Will this motivational advertisement somewhat heal the public relations crisis it has faced on these high volatility stocks? Robinhood expressed that “We’re launching a campaign during the Big Game this Sunday in hopes of reaching and empowering millions of people with one simple but important message.”
When questioned how Robinhood intended to answer customer claims that the company had broken its brand mission “to democratise finance for all” and how the Super Bowl ad fits into how Robinhood communicates with customers, Chief Marketing Officer Christina Smedley said the business is seeing customers join the app and curious to understand more about it.
Many people all across social media are slamming Robinhood by saying this is an advertisement for “damage control” and how by making an advertisement, it will only make it worse. The profits Robinhood will make off of this advertisement may be huge money wise, but what about their name? After the spikes and trading activity with GameStop (NYSE: GME) and many other companies which led to restricting trading to prevent further controversy towards trading.
The activities being done today (February 7th, 2021) for the Super Bowl in terms of advertising may keep Robinhood in the spotlight for a much longer time than they planned to be as now everyone is choosing them as a target about the advertising they have done. It seems to be yet another marketing nightmare for Robinhood especially after the trading chaos.
The founder of Robinhood, Vladimir Tenev, and Keith Gill who was responsible for causing the majority of the GameStop (NYSE: GME) spike are set to testify on February 18th, 2021 where the series of events that took place in the markets recently are expected to be discussed.
Seems like this month will be an interesting one for Robinhood, especially after they had a large increase of day-trading users that were joined in late January. Now with their reputation with the Super Bowl and with Vladimir Tenev testifying, things will be interesting for Robinhood over the next while.
What do you think? Is the advertising worth it for Robinhood, or should they have laid low?
Written by: Ali Malik and Karthik Ganapathiraju
