The world is in turmoil. Or, in the words of the great Stephen Colbert: “Hey, 2020 – one crisis at a time, will ya?”
Unfortunately, 2020 is not listening. And we hope you marketers out there have been paying close attention. Because somehow, for the ordinary 9to5 people that most marketing professionals are, it’s pretty insane how deeply our jobs are being affected by everything that’s been going on in recent months.
From the coronavirus pandemic and its global lockdowns and recession to the killing of George Floyd at the hands of police and the ensuing Black Lives Matter protests – the way brands are communicating through it all is under unprecedented scrutiny.
Predominantly, to show support for racial justice and social equality, brands worldwide have been stepping up to the plate in one way or another.
After months of creative, impactful help that brands provided to battle COVID-19 effects, the first significant step brands took to show their support for BLM, was by posting black images on social feeds (sometimes with white writing on it), using the hashtag #BlackOutTuesday.
Over 1000 national brands participated, while some brands were even closing stores and urging employees to protest peacefully.
“It is a day to take a beat for an honest, reflective, and productive conversation about what actions we need to take to support the Black community collectively,” music executives Jamila Thomas and Brianna Agyemang, who were spearheading the initiative, wrote online.
But, as marketers are learning by the day right now, it’s not easy to always avoid criticism, and this initiative led to a few reactions.
People started saying that posting these images with the additional Black Lives Matter hashtag actually hurt the cause of getting the word out there because it flooded the hashtag and pushed down videos of protests and other more “grassroots” kind of posts.
if you’re participating in black out tuesday, make sure you don’t use the black lives matter hashtag for this reason https://t.co/DdrSA8pHrM
— agz (@AlexisGZall) June 2, 2020
Secondly, many voices were raised in response, saying that these black images don’t really help anyone. We need actions.
And that’s when we started seeing more and more brands taking real actions. Like promoting and donating to organizations, sharing stories of employees, handing their social media accounts to different organizations for 24 hours, and taking a bit of a more aggressive tone in their messages.
One brand that managed to be powerful from a single post is BabyNames.com. The website uploaded a picture filled with names of “somebody’s baby” who died at the hands of the police:
And if you’re looking for some inspiration as to the kind of real action business leaders can take, look no further than Alexis Ohanian.
The co-founder and executive chairman of Reddit, and husband of Serena Williams, stepped down from the company’s board, asking to be replaced by a Black board member, which happened within a matter of days.
Patagonia CEO, Rose Marcario, is also stepping down and has become the exemplar for social and environmental activism.
Additional brands have committed to establishing a diverse workforce and inclusive culture by hiring more Black employees (and models, in fashion). Marc Jacobs has already posted more inclusive photos, while brands such as Sephora and Rent the Runway have committed to the 15% pledge to support black-owned brands.
Brands are now deep into the stage of taking true actions, and it happened quite quickly. But there’s more to be done, of course.