In May 2015, sports apparel maker Under Armour found itself in the middle of a huge controversy. UA had produced a t-shirt that showed a silhouette of a group of basketball players raising a goal post, imitating the famous Joe Rosenthal photograph of U.S. servicemen raising an American flag over Iwo Jima during WWII. They named the shirt a "Band of Ballers.” The shirt was a clever take on the historic photo, but the complaints were immediate and harsh. People filled UA’s social media sites with comments claiming they had desecrated the sacrifice of the military by making light of the iconic photo (it should be noted that over 6,500 Americans were killed in the Battle of Iwo Jima, including three of the six men who raised the flag on Mount Suribachi.) UA pulled the shirts and issued an apology. Even after the apology, people were attacking their insensitivity and claiming they would never buy UA products again.

What do you do when your marketing crosses the line of decency with a group of people? What is edgy and innovative to one person is completely out of line and offensive to another. It is important to test a marketing concept out with your target market before you produce and distribute it. They are the ones who should be the ultimate judge of what is acceptable or unacceptable in marketing. However, in this case, UA’s target market is not veterans of WWII. They are selling to a much younger demographic that is active, especially in sports. I would suspect that teenagers and twenty-somethings had no problem with the "Band of Ballers” t-shirt. However, you also have to be aware of the influencers in the marketplace. These are people who may never buy any of your products, but have a huge impact on the people who fall into your target market. In today’s marketplace, influencers are all over the place! It seems like every group has a cause, so how do you determine which group to listen to and which group to ignore? If you try to placate every special interest group with your marketing, you will have very bland marketing that attracts no one and sells nothing. I believe it all comes down to what your target market values. What do I mean by the word "values”? Values are deeply held beliefs by groups of people. When we divide people into age demographics, we will often assign general values to the group. In the case of UA’s target market, there is a respect for the military that is a value. That same value may have been missing from someone who came of age in the 1960s. So, when someone who is much older than them who has military connections was offended by the "Band of Ballers” t-shirt, the younger set was influenced and incensed too.

I believe UA did all they could do to make the situation right after the fact. They admitted they were wrong. They stated that they supported the military. They stopped selling the shirt. They claimed this would never happen again. I suspect someone was also fired. Repenting of your corporate sins is all you can do. But what can you do before the product is released to make sure you are not crossing a line? Marketing is charged with pushing the line of good tastes, especially in advertising, to get people to look at your product. How do you know when you have overstepped decency in the minds of your target market and the influencers who control what they think? I would suggest a VAC Analysis that examines the values, attitudes, and choices of not only the target market, but the influencers as well. (See my previous article, Want to be effective in marketing? Know your clients.) In taking the time to examine what your clients are thinking, you will avoid these types of pitfalls. You can also use an old tried and true method: focus groups. Getting a group of people together that are representational of both the target market and their influencers will help you avoid running into this kind of obstacle.