Political Correctness

Political Correctness is the Enemy of Brands
By Tom Dougherty

Stop With Political Correctness

Political correctness is the enemy of great brands. It is, in fact, the enemy of great marketing. The finest brands and the best marketing are those that seem most transparent to the customer. When a consumer sees an advertisement, they should see the brand and not be aware of the message. When they see the brand, they should see themselves and not all of the product attributes.

Clarity Is Your Ally

Clarity and single-mindedness are the allies of great brand building. These disciplines of focus should find their way into all of your brand and corporate communications. Anything that detracts from that focus needs to be eliminated and trimmed — it’s waste.

Think of your brand and it’s subsequent messaging as if it was a telegram and you were paying dearly for every word and every idea. Any wasted energy is a destructive force and needs to be quieted. Any message that is not within the charter of your brand diminishes its effectiveness by drawing attention to the medium and away from the message itself.

Recently at a cinema, I witnessed an ad for a hearing loss center. In the ad, the hearing loss center was attempting to encourage viewers who were in the beginnings of hearing loss, that the center was in a position to help them. In the lower right hand corner of the commercial was a pullout window where an eager young gal used sign language to repeat the voice over.

This is a prime example of political correctness infecting a brand message. Anyone who is schooled in understanding sign language does not need a hearing center — they have obviously already sought treatment. It was an attempt on the part of the brand to pander to special interest groups and curry favors that had nothing to do with the future success of the services they provided. It seemed out of place in the message and diluted the effectiveness of the advertisement. The brand did not address the underlying issues involved in the stigma of hearing loss — the very issues that hinder acceptance of treatment. There was no attempt in the brand message to reassure the viewers with hearing loss that they were not in anyway marginalized and that the loss of hearing was not an embarrassment. In a category that sells services, they have not addressed the root cause of acceptance in the way that eyeglasses are no longer stigmatizing.