P&G: Respect Your Target Customers
Talking about the social media crisis in the beauty/skincare industry, the first example that pops up in my head is P&G. Last year, this was one of the most famous social media crises in China. Majoring in marketing, I believe a lot of students from my major take P&G as their dream company, and P&G had recruited tons of talented marketers. Therefore, it is so difficult to understand why P&G made such a mistake that is easy to avoid.
Last year in March, P&G China posted an article on their official WeChat public account. The article was titled Women’s Feet Are 5 Times Stinkier Than Men’s, Smell It If You Don’t Believe It! In the article, it is said to reveal some “truth” about women’s odor. Here are some subtitles:
1: Women’s feet are 5 times stinkier than men’s.
2: Women have body odor too and breasts smell the worst.
3: No matter how clean a woman is, her underwear is dirtier than that of a man.
4: Unlike men who wash their hair every day, women’s hair is twice as dirty as men’s.
In the end, the article said that women are not stinky in daily life because they are using P&G’s products.
The logic of this article is a typical “creating needs for customers” type. However, the content was so insulting and the data was not true at all. Psychologically, how could customers accept the ad and buy products if you are insulting them? Not to mention that most of P&G’s key customers are women. Also, before posting this article, there should be levels of checking, reviewing, and verifying. Anyone who considers this ad inappropriate can stop posting and send it back to rewrite. This could be such a simple and easy-to-avoid mistake, but P&G failed to do so. P&G has no one to blame but itself.
After this ad was posted, a serious social media crisis happened. Customers were so angry and posted to boycott P&G’s products. Official newspapers and other public accounts also posted on social media to criticize P&G’s marketing.
As public opinion expanded, P&G deleted the article and issued an apology statement. It said that P&G has always promoted the values of equality, inclusion, and respect. They have deleted this article and are seriously rectifying the operation of the account, and will reflect deeply and prevent similar situations.
Unfortunately, customers were not satisfied. China’s feminism trend has been popular among the whole society these years, and it was not the first time in recent years that brands in China posted ads that disrespect female customers, and P&G made this mistake in a sensitive circumstance. In June, it was announced that P&G China was fined 700,000 RMB because of publishing this fake ad that insulted women.
As time pass, the detail of this crisis might be forgotten by people, but the brand image of P&G is significantly influenced. Hopefully, there will be no brands who make such mistakes as P&G does in the future.
