So, how is it possible that no one at H&M, ranging from account managers, creatives, art directors, photographers to even social media managers raised a red flag throughout the production of this online ad? It’s honestly tough for me to believe that every one of them chose to take a pass on reacting to this. Realize it’s 2020, seriously: All of us live in a global world, selling to audiences that are increasingly diverse and sensitive to a multiplicity of issues.Their initial apology read, “We are deeply sorry that the picture was taken and we also regret the actual print… Therefore, we have not only removed the image from our channels, but also the garment from our product offering globally.” When pressed about how the offensive image even made it past their creative process, H&M told global business news outlet Quartz that, “We believe in diversity and inclusion in all that we do and will be reviewing all our internal policies accordingly to avoid any future issues.” I’ll bet my Alexa could have come up with a better response (no offense to her). Listen and learn from controversy: Even after the uproar H&M, initially failed to understand the problem.On his Instagram account, drummer and producer Questlove drove home exactly this point, “all this tells me about is that the seats in the boardroom lack something… wanna take a guess?” However, all of us have the obligation to reach out and include their voices on the team that creates our products. None of us can intimately know what it’s like to live in someone else’s skin. Hire diverse individuals on your creative team: This controversy clearly reinstates the need to have a variety of voices on your team.Companies, especially those in the retail industry, must be overly conscious of how their products are perceived by consumers. This is truly a Marketing 101 lesson, so I’m wondering how H&M missed it. Test a campaign with different audiences: This begins at the initial stages of the creative process so you can catch any issues before you make a campaign public, whether it’s on social media, in print, or your website.Such incidents of tone-deafness can teach all of us in marketing about four important things: For example, many brands that took part in the June 2 #BlackOutTuesday, posting black squares to their Instagram grids in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement, are being called out for being merely performative and virtue signalling. “Slacktivism” isn’t the way to deal with this.
These conversations are important, and it’s vital that employees and customers have the opportunity to voice their experiences about these brands, so we can decide whether we continue to support them.
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