Hi there,
I am in Leipzig this week, checking out our German office and team and it’s going really well… crazy to see how the team has grown so much! Anyways, seven days back in the home country means plenty of sausages, Brötchen and beers! Luckily, I’ve been keeping up with my runs to balance it all out. And I randomly thought back to a Nike ad that didn’t work out so well.
Back in April, a Nike ad outside the Boston Marathon poked fun at slower runners, blew up online within days, and Nike pulled it by the end of the week.
That’s old news by now, but I’m still thinking about it in August because it’s the cleanest example I’ve come across all year of a bigger shift happening across marketing right now:
More brands are no longer afraid of controversy. They’re building for it.
I want to use this issue to break down why that shift is happening, what separates the brands doing it well, and what I think it actually means for anyone building a campaign right now.
WHY NEUTRAL HAS BECOME INVISIBLE
Social feeds don’t reward correctness. They reward friction… a sharp opinion, an emotional reaction, something worth arguing about in the comments. Strategists call this “algo-branding”, which means brands behave in the way the algorithm reward visibilty. In a hyper-fragmented attention economy, being liked by everyone means being noticed by no one. A piece of content that makes someone feel something (even irritation), competes against almost nothing. It’s one of the only things left that reliably cuts through.
NIKE VS. ASICS AT BOSTON
This is the case study I’m referring to. Ahead of the Boston Marathon this year, Nike put a sign in its Newbury Street store window: “Runners Welcome. Walkers Tolerated.”
It was meant to be a wink to serious runners. Instead, it read as an insult to everyone who wasn’t fast enough… and it spread fast. Nike pulled it within about a week and issued the standard “we missed the mark” apology. On the other hand, Asics put up their own sign: “Runners. Walkers. All Welcome.” Same event, same audience, same news cycle and Asics walked away owning the story Nike accidentally started.
What actually happened here isn’t “Nike said something dumb.” It’s that Nike created controversy without conviction, and Asics had a rehearsed, on-brand answer ready the moment the door opened.
CONVICTION IS THE PRODUCT, NOT THE PROVOCATION
The brands winning with controversy right now aren’t the loudest ones, they’re the ones whose provocation reinforces something the brand already stands for.
American Eagle’s “Great Jeans” campaign with Sydney Sweeney sparked genuine backlash over its wordplay, and the brand never apologized or pulled it. * Result: the collection sold out in days, the stock jumped 25%, and the company added close to a million new customers in six weeks.
For Liquid Death, conviction is the product. Tallboy cans of water, sold under the tagline “Murder Your Thirst.” The brand is aimed squarely at people who’d normally reach for a Monster or a Coke, not the yoga-and-electrolytes crowd. From mockumentaries to fake death-metal merch, everything about Liquid Death feels more like an edgy entertainment brand than a water company. * Result: $2.8M in sales in 2019 to $333M in revenue and a $1.4B valuation by 2024, and became the most-followed water brand on both TikTok and Instagram
THE ONE RULE
Rosie Brown said it best: “Backlash on a campaign is survivable. Backlash on your identity isn’t. The brands that flinch lose twice.”
A campaign can be wrong and get pulled… that’s a bad week. The moment backlash starts questioning who you are as a company, you’re no longer managing a PR issue. You’re managing a trust collapse, and trust doesn’t come back with an apology post.
THE BIGGER PICTURE
My honest take: Don’t chase controversy for its own sake, chase conviction, and accept controversy as an occasional side effect. Before anything ships, ask one question: if this gets attacked, does defending it make us look more like ourselves, or less?
Nike’s answer was less. Asics’, Liquid Death’s, and American Eagle’s was more.
The brands that will win the next few years of attention aren’t the safest ones. They’re the ones who know exactly which fights are worth fighting and have the nerve to stay in them once the comments start.
WHAT’S HOT
- The art of selling boring products: How you can stand out in a “saturated market”
- This is your sign make a GitHub account: For future marketers trying to make an impact and have your ideas seen… the new wave is GitHub and you need to add it to your skillset.
- Content creators 🤝 artists: Large companies use livestreamers to control the narrative, connect with fans, and create more opportunities for revenue.
Hope you liked today’s letter, lots of info I hope you learn from. See you next week.
-Benni
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