Amplifying WOM around Taboos
June 20th, 2007
We have recently been posed with a challenge that has us pondering “How do you start WOM around taboo topics?” Norelco famously normalized the topic of male body shaving with their genius campaign & microsite www.shaveeverywhere.com. While the folks at Queer Eye had already injected “manscaping” into popular culture, Norelco took the next step in spurring discussion by approaching this topic with humor (they coined the term “optical inch” which I find so funny that I am dropping it into conversations inappropriately).
If we broadly describe taboos topics in the US as conversations around religion, money, sex, and the human body, what tools beyond humor do we have to comfortably invite engagement and encourage messages to travel? Cause creation is a possibility because it helps us abstract these topics away from from ourselves and talk about greater issues. Others? If I had the world’s best product or microsite for triumphing over foot fungus, is there any way for me to get you to pass the word along either online or offline?
Other posts by Virginia.
David Binkowski says:
Jeez, talk about hitting the nail on the head - you’ve brought up two clients (Philips and Novartis) who’ve used humor and entertainment, respectively, to educate (manscaping and athlete’s foot) people on touchy subjects… this usually requires great insights and a lot of creativity to get people talking about uncomfortable subjects.
Dave
June 21st, 2007 at 4:07 pmChristy says:
So what’s the answer, Dave?
Humor is hard to do, but it works. But, is there anything else? I’m not so sure there’s anything else quite as viable as humor.
I can’t look at a kiwi the same ever again.
June 22nd, 2007 at 9:49 am