Tactical or tacky: A look at trolling in advertising

First things first: the whole Sydney Sweeney thing is not new.

You know the campaign by now: American Eagle's latest includes a play on the word ‘jeans’/‘genes’ — the virtues of both espoused by a young, famous, white woman using the fry-iest of vocal fry.

The campaign’s been called ‘controversial’, and has been accused of ‘glorifying a racial ideal’ — the word ‘eugenics’ has even been thrown around.

And not without cause. The white standard of beauty is dominant and stubbornly pervasive in western society — especially, but far from exclusively, in the fashion industry. So pointing and crying ‘shame’ is a predictable response.

And, from an advertiser’s perspective: it’s also the point.

But hold that thought.

Unoriginal, but not unaware

As mentioned, there are many accusatory (and accurate... and justified) words being used to describe the campaign. However, we're going to focus on two.

Let's start with ‘unoriginal’. Calvin Klein got here first, with Brooke Shields. Both CK’s and AE’s campaigns feature a sex symbol of their respective modern days, writhing in an empty white (coincidence?) studio, flirting with those same homonyms.

The ad’s theme isn’t even original in this moment. This year, Dunkin’ confusingly entered the chat with actor Gavin Casalegno crediting his genes for (irony of ironies) the hue of his tan — in an effort to sell flavoured lemonade.

The second word is ‘unaware’. Specifically, of the dog whistle they’re blowing.

At the risk of sounding defensive: the folks working in advertising are not dummies. They have access to reams of consumer data and focus testing. They’ve vetted their creative ideas numerous times with internal stakeholders and decision makers.

Above: Screenshot of a comment on YouTube user Alien Ads 801 's upload of the AE Sydney Sweeney ad (linked in this article).

The campaign is not a mistake, its messages are not a miscalculation.

The resulting controversy is not accidental: it’s intentional. And it’s working.

Outrage as a line item in your earned media planning

Just look at AE’s response to the campaign. 10 — maybe even five — years ago, this non-apology would be chastised. The campaign would be recalled. The crocodile tears around ‘unintended interpretations’ would flow.

Today? It’s not outlandish to think the statement was drafted before the first ad hit the market. The response to, and defense of, the campaign wasn’t a reaction by AE. We’re guessing it was part of the plan. We’d put money on it.

Per Forbes: the AE ‘Sydney’ ultra wide-legged jean (worn in the ad campaign) has sold out. The stock price soared. And the brand name is being discussed — yes, with some derision, but discussed nonetheless.

Meanwhile, the earned media surrounding the campaign costs the brand nothing, while greatly increasing its reach and visibility to those seeking to see what the fuss is all about (and whether they want to fuss along with it). Case in point: one estimate says AE's average daily mentions on social media grew from 67 to a whopping 33,000.

In an attention economy, the only thing more valuable than relevance is outrage. 

That’s the strategy, in a nutshell. And it’s aided by a political climate that embraces, in a word, trolling — a pendulum swing from the proliferation of social conscientiousness of the past decade or two. But that’s as close to the sun as we’ll fly into that topic, for now.

In an attention economy, it seems the only thing more valuable than relevance is outrage.

Is trolling good advertising?

But it begs the question: Is reigniting and weaponizing harmful, outdated stereotypes and offending large parts of the populous the best way to achieve an advertiser's business goals? Or, more simply put…

Trolling clearly works. But is it “good” advertising? Is it an advisable brand strategy?

Some might say ‘yes’. Advertising is intended to be provocative. Its goal is to ‘incept’ a Nolan-esque idea so infectious in a consumer’s mind that they're compelled to act on it — with their wallets (metaphorically… it’s all tap, nowadays).

To that end, provocation is a necessity.

And for the people who’d defend AE’s campaign, and campaigns like it: the end seems to justify the means. The brand's leadership is beholden to driving share price. Mission accomplished. 

After all, business objectives are… objective. If you’ve experienced quarterly growth, your sales graph looks the same whether that growth is absent of, or aided by, a culture war. Sales are sales, and success (when measured by the standard of profit) is success.

Of course, the long-term impacts on the brand are yet to be determined. There are some early indicators that AE may face some sort of financial penance, but they’re not definitive. Politics and attention shift wildly and quickly nowadays.

As do brand sensibilities. It wasn’t long ago that AE’s own Aerie brand was heralded for featuring diversity, inclusion and body positivity in its marketing. Going from that kind of praise to accusations of promoting eugenics is a staggering about-face. Which suggests either the brand’s consumer data shows a drastic change in their target audience...

Or that they’re ignoring that audience altogether.

Should advertising strive to be more than ‘effective’?

For now, let’s dispense with theories about a company’s private consumer data. Let’s set aside subjective ideas of good or bad, right or wrong (although, for the record, our take is ‘bad’ and ‘wrong’).

And let’s accept that provocation isn’t the problem.

At its best, advertising can (and in our view, should) provoke without poking someone in the eye. It can be clever, funny, heartbreaking, sincere, surprising, or even risqué without cavalierly or intentionally alienating entire populations who’ve been (and are still being) told their genes are inferior, or their beauty is substandard.

That said, advertising shouldn’t be ‘for everyone’: audience targeting indicates exactly what sensibilities your tone and message should home in on, at the calculated risk of others self-selecting out of the queue.

Audience Targeting 101: If you're trying to appeal to everyone, you won't persuade anyone.

Ads can be provocative — even as they turn a few people off — without courting harmful stereotypes. Perhaps you can get attention much quicker by being deliberately and knowingly offensive. But that doesn’t define good advertising. Effective does not equal excellence.

Case in point: being a bully is an empirically effective means of getting someone’s lunch money. But it’s not worth celebrating.

(Plus — it’s downright cliché.)

While racism and sexism are unequivocally more heinous offenses: unoriginality may be the cardinal sin of advertising.

Eventually, and probably soon, the outrage will fade (like everything else in the ether — and, like Sydney’s literal jeans). Some other ‘outrageous’ ad will ring in our ears, instead.

Hopefully, it will be just as calculated, but less cruel and better crafted.