It's a sad saga. On the one hand, it demonstrates the wide ranging negative impact an ill-conceived change can have on a high-flying brand. On the other hand, it suggests that corporate arrogance can quickly be replaced with humility when customers voice their displeasure.

Such is the story of Netflix, which has been caught in a wild ride (a faltering stock price combined with customers fleeing for the exit) since it announced a price increase just months ago. The company thought it could smooth over the problem by spinning off its DVD-only rental service into something it called "Qwikster." Apparently some marketing genius figured out that making a clean break from the rapidly growing streaming service was the answer to its very public bungle.Continue reading...

In the wake of a tainted infant formula scandal that killed six babies and hospitalized 860 in China in 2008, a New Zealand-based company came up with a way to capitalize on the market's fear.

But when the company chose what it saw as a simple local logo to help the product seem more foreign, little did it know that forces were set in motion that would unravel the whole scam.Continue reading...

Well, this is uncomfortable. Hong Kong-born soy sauce and food brand Amoy is attached to a Facebook app that allows people to Asianate themselves. British marketer Gavin Marshall asks on Twitter, "Is this the most inappropriate use of Facebook by a brand yet?" It's certainly one for the social marketing hall of shame.Continue reading...

Valentine's Day is the one time of the year you want to say it with flowers — and not to apologize.

Yet FTD and 1-800-Flowers both spent Valentine's Day on virtual bended knee, apologizing to the thousands of customers each brand managed to irk on what should have been their biggest sales day of the year.

1-800-Flowers, which launched the first Facebook store in 2009, somehow managed to not deliver thousands of floral arrangements that were ordered online, and is now vowing to make it up the intended recipients and the purchases. A character named Tina Flowers on its Facebook page is reaching out to disgruntled customers to make up for the mishap.

And FTD found itself in the doghouse this Valentine's Day after partnering with a brand recovering from its own PR disaster — Groupon.Continue reading...

Unwanted exposure is a reality of brand ownership.

A brand marketer everything possible to portray a brand in a positive light, only to have so much of it eroded by some negative publicity that's completely out of the brand's control.

Consider the so-called Craig's List Killer ... Best Buy and the "God Squad" ... the rogue video-making Dominos employees ... or Accenture and Tiger Woods. And that's just the tip of the iceberg.

But a smaller-scale kind of negative exposure is emerging as newspapers catch on to the grim popularity of publishing mug shots in a police blotter section.

In addition to The Smoking Gun website, news outlets across the US, from St. Louis to Kentucky to Ft. Myers, are increasingly featuring mug shots. (Last year, Change.org even posed the question, "Can mug shots save the newspaper industry?")

Many of these mug shots are of employees in branded, work-related garb, leaving  one to wonder if, and to what degree, positive brand perception is being eroded with potential consumers?Continue reading...

Ah, Diesel. When we last visited the brand desperately trying to insult anything and everything (including intelligence), Diesel was imploring consumers to "Be stupid." It appears Diesel took its own advice with the new campaign for its "Kick Ass" shoes.

Watch the above spot and see if you get the intelligent subtlety embedded within the campaign. But wait, there's more!Continue reading...

A while back we looked at how the popularity of the Old Spice guy had inspired not only spoofs, but also a genre of over-the-top absurdist ad messaging. Well, if you ever wondered how the Old Spice Guy genre ad could go so off the rails as to make you as uncomfortable as the original Old Spice ads made you laugh, we've got the campaign for you. Ladies and gentlemen, we present: "A Date with Stayfree." Continue reading...

From time to time, brands looking to be on the bleeding edge of cool become completely untethered from reality.

Creative pitch sessions go off the rails and devolve into a feedback loop of hip, where relativist style means there is no longer any such thing as good or bad taste. Only later, in the daylight and the fallout, does the insanity of the concept become clear. That is about the time a brand finds itself muttering, "We never intended..."

MAC cosmetics has found itself in just such a place with its latest collaboration.Continue reading...