Dancing (on the ashes) for Japan
by asi
Last week I had an interesting conversation with someone (who knows one or two things about Japanese culture) about the various initiatives taken by brands and agencies in support of the Japan crisis and the perhaps over commercialisation of some of these initiatives.
I can’t remember when was the last time I was so ambivalent about something.
‘Align around good’. Already sounds a cliche but still is one of the most important sentiments and behavioral shifts in marketing and corporate culture, and digital (platforms and cultures) have massively contributed to this shift. For few years we have proudly been preaching and teaching our clients to ‘do good’ and be creative in the ways you communicate it.
It works 99% of times and it’s almost always the right thing to do but in the case of the Japanese disaster some initiatives as well as the way people marketed these initiatives left me with some weird feeling. I thought about it for few days before writing this post and I realised that it’s mainly the Japanese stoic people, culture and response to the crisis that is in contrast to some of the shouty initiatives taken by brands and agencies.
Perhaps the genuine motivation to help was somewhat, occasionally, overshadowed by being too shouty and salesy about it as if it’s just another exercise in shifting people behaviours or as if there’s a new category in Cannes or Webby’s for ‘best crisis relief initiative’ (you could see the award entry video around some of these initiatives).
Perhaps there are some occasions that the old-school practice of just quietly donating your money without trying to mobilise anyone else, without making a graphic design or branding of it, without shouting all over twitter is the right thing to do.
Take a look at what some big Japanese companies are doing (you’ll have to dig around) and you’ll find out that the money they have contributed quietly (almost discreetly) is way more than some of the crowd-sourced branded stuff.
I don’t really have a conclusion to this – perhaps you do
I’m glad you wrote this Asi. I had very similar thoughts – and also didn’t feel comfortable talking about them. Especially seeing as some of the activity was created by friends of mine.
My main gripe was this:
At the time of seeing most of the ‘look at our creative idea and then help Japan’ activity, the disaster was on the news 24-7.
I.e. there was no need to ‘create awareness’. We were all very, very aware. That is the single reason I found some of it selfish.
One example made me so angry, I unfollowed its creator (a person I normally admire).
As time passes, I actually think these tactics are increasingly relevant, simply because we tend to ‘forget’ very quickly. As the water returns to normal levels, so too do we return to our daily routines – but of course there is still a great need for help in Japan. It is now (while people start to forget) that people should be using creativity to remind people that help is still needed.
To counter my own argument, the other way to look at it is that if activity I deemed exploitative persuaded/reminded even one more person to help then it was worthwhile. After all, my gripe was merely an emotional side-effect that few people in the disaster would be interested in. If the activity that angered me earned even one donation at the expense of my anger, then in the grand scheme of things it’s probably a good thing.
It’s a bit of a moral quagmire, so there are no absolute conclusions. But my one take out is the timing. If everyone’s talking about it, awareness shouldn’t be the objective. Anyone working in marketing should know that.
You’re not wrong Asi. In fact it was largely disgusting how agencies in particular piggy backed off the crisis to demonstrate their ‘innovation’. The countless number of ‘art projects’ like Anomaly’s 1000 Crane project did nothing but inspire cynical feelings from someone who sat there and though the less gauche thing to do would be just fork out a few grand as an agency and donate it quietly. Maybe put a button on the agency website as a direct call to action for visitors to donate would be nice too.
I’ve got nothing against the idea of art inspired by a crisis, but would rather people didn’t lie about the core motive.
Andy: re your comment about “if activity reminded even one more person to help then it was worthwhile” – this simply isn’t true.
A campaign that gets 1,000 individuals to donate a few pounds isn’t reliably going to achieve a goal – whereas an agency making a decision to donate a decent sum of hard cash is a very real outcome that helps people. In a situation where even ATM machines were encouraging people to donate towards the crisis, there was very little an agency could do to extend that reach with a silly art project.