PR News Updates feat. Merce Brown

Ring Doorbell, AI slop, and Frida Baby backlash. This week on the Brand Shorthand podcast, Mark is joined by special guest, Merce Brown, to talk about the recent chatter in the world of Public Relations. Be sure to tune in to hear how our public relations expert would deal with crisis communication and what her perspective is on these current news updates. 

Join Mark and Merce for 30-ish as they discuss all things marketing, advertising, and of course … positioning!

Transcript

Mark Vandegrift
Welcome to the Brand Shorthand Podcast. I'm your host, Mark Vandegrift, and with me today is a very special guest. You've met her before, Mercedes Brown. She is our content manager and PR manager, and she has been on a few episodes talking about public relations. We always like to get her perspective on something crazy going on in the inner webs in the world of PR. So we're going to talk about some updates today. And for those that saw our last episode that had everything to do with the Super Bowl ads, one of those that we talked about was Ring Doorbells ad and their dog finder app. So, that, yeah, that sparked a lot of conversation, didn't it, Merce?

Mercedes Brown
Yes, it did. It's actually been ongoing and it has actually become more and more relevant, especially if you've been following like the Savannah Guthrie conversation and her her mom who has gone missing. So they've only continued to have to do more interviews and more response time and definitely a lot of mixed feelings all around about the tech and like the world we're living in might be cyberpunk 2077 before we know.

Mark Vandegrift
Well, personally, I saw that and my immediate reaction was, dogs, huh? That was that's probably what a lot of people thought. And I think when these companies put out this new technology, I don't know if they could have a panel or do some research or whatever a focus group that might give them an indicator of how people may react, because it didn't take long to get all the chatter online going about, oh big brother's watching.

Mercedes Brown
Yes, exactly. I think one thing that shows maybe my age more is I think I was a little unfazed. Like I think I've always grown up in a world that's constantly under surveillance and everything is recorded. So, to me, it felt a little bit, I mean, yeah, of course, like I wouldn't want to be personally recorded. We don't even have a ring doorbell at our house yet. We're still shopping around for one. But, you know, I just, think for me, that's like a given about society. I'm not asking to be surveilled, but like, it's kind of like, yeah, we kind of all knew you could do that. Thanks for sharing that feature.

Mark Vandegrift
So what's the chatter right now? What are you seeing?

Mercedes Brown 
Yeah, so they, of course, as soon as the Super Bowl ad went out, people had the same exact reaction as you. They were kind of like, yeah, we kind of know that that's not just about dogs. I think that is especially in light with, you know, people's obsession with true crime. you know, Ring Doorbell has kind of tried to pivot that conversation from Big Brother watching you to look at all the crime we can catch on our camera that's always watching you. Actually, interestingly enough, one of the things I think they have done that's been a good response at least is they've had their founder do a ton of interviews on major news networks. So he's kind of been on the TV for the last few weeks doing interviews about the various things from, you know, talking about this search party feature. Also, they did announce that they are not doing their flock technology integration any longer. There's a lot of confusion, I think to the consumer about what all these different programs are. At the end of the day, perception wise, people just see all of these different programs as the same thing, which is just, you're watching me and I know you're watching me. Now you're telling me you're watching me. So I think that's like the gist of it. So really they've done this concerted effort to go on TV to explain the difference between the flock integration, which is focused on crime fighting. They were going to partner with this, with flock, which is a huge security technology basically. So that was planned for I think sometime into this quarter to launch with law enforcement. But that was separate from search party. Search party was all about dogs and like helping your neighbor and you find out what's going on in your neighborhood. But at the end of the day, like I said, like people don't care what the end use is. It's the same thing. But they've been going online to explain the difference and to explain how maybe search party differentiates from flock. And also differentiating Ring from other doorbell competitors, which has been an interesting, you know, conversation for them. Because again, as a, you know, general consumer, most people are only thinking about the doorbells in terms of there's all these different doorbell brands. They all did the same thing. They're all recording, keeping me safe in my home. So I know what's going on with my property. But Ring's done another concert effort to talk about how unlike Nest, they don't technically keep your data so long as you opt out or don't pay the subscription. So that's been another way they've been combating that conversation about privacy.

Mark Vandegrift
Do you think that from a crisis communication perspective that they were prepared for this based on what you're seeing their responses or do you think it caught them off guard?

Mercedes Brown 
I think they were prepared, if you've been following Ring at all in the last few years, which by the way is owned by Amazon, which probably doesn't help their case either. But if you've been following them, they did have a settlement with the FTC a couple of years ago, based on the same kind of concept that employees had been watching or accessing customer cameras without asking permission. And then that kind of devolved and has created what Ring is today, which is that they no longer save any footage, so they claim, off your camera unless you're a subscriber. So if you're a subscriber, you are opting into having your data collected and put in their cloud. Otherwise they say anything that's recorded is immediately deleted off of your doorbell, but that's only a result of five years ago. So I think honestly they are, they were prepared for this only because they've already kind of faced the hard hitting lawsuits. So now, you know, having their founder out forward facing, I think that's all been really kosher for them going forward. So we'll see. I don't know if it'll stop people from buying rings, but I think one thing to think about over this whole conversation that's been kind of interesting has been, I don't know if you saw this Mark, but there was a parody video that was created by a competitor. 

Mark Vandegrift
No, I didn't see that.

Mercedes Brown
Oh, it's funny. So I'd never heard of this camera company before, but they kind of did a whole spoof. They recreated the whole Ring ad, and it's called, I think it's called Wyse Guys, but they think they make their own camera brand, but the premise is not about cloud-based tech. or even signing up for a subscription, another subscription to pay money for security, to keep your own footage. They actually do cameras with SD cards. So it's all your, your content. You can do whatever you want. It's also significantly cheaper than a ring. I don't know if any of our audience members have shopped for a Ring or a Nest. They're not cheap. And then you get a subscription on top of that. So, definitely a better value consumer product if you have values for security and all that. So they've taken this opportunity to take advantage of Ring and launch the spoof. So I highly encourage people to go watch the video. It's quite funny. It's all about how, you know, this is we've been talking about. It's not the dog they're looking for. They're looking for you. So it's great. But I think that's another good pivot.

Mark Vandegrift 
Yeah, we, we have a, you Eufy, so it's E-U-F-Y and they do the same thing. Their SD card. And ironically last night for the first time ever, we got a warning that there were a bunch of wrong codes entered. So we think maybe someone was out there sniffing around or it was a deer that decided to smell the keypad. Cause we have a lot of deer over there too, but we had to turn up our, our video surveillance a little bit so that, we could see if anybody else tries to come back and get in, but it's all SD card based. So we don't, we don't have to worry about our stuff getting out there. So, question, if I'm walking down the street and you have a subscription, so you're allowed to record whatever you want. If I'm walking down the street in front, I'm not giving up my, I haven't opted in or opted out to walk down the street to be recorded by someone that has a subscription on Ring. So what's it has there been any chatter online about recording people that aren't part of it or aren't even on your property because that sidewalk that I'm walking by is not your private property.

Mercedes Brown 
Yes, that has been a huge topic of conversation because the question is when does it become your property and not somebody else's right to just exist? The difference between Ring and say maybe the other controversies we're going to touch base on are things that have happened recently is that this one carries way more legal weight and implications for the future. So while Ring might be handling this from a publicity standpoint, I'm very certain that their legal team is aware that this could easily spiral into some kind of congressional action at some point because this is only going get worse. But as of right now, there's nothing protecting people from being recorded or keeping that kind of information on their ring. So just something to keep in mind when you're going on your little neighborhood stroll. So you better keep your lips shut if you are in neighborhood gossip.

Mark Vandegrift
Well, the good thing is I don't go to try stealing Amazon boxes or anything like that, but.

Mercedes Brown 
Yeah. Well, I feel like that's another thing that makes the conversation mixed for Ring. And I think they do a good job trying to keep it positive. Again, they differentiate from Nest, which is always recording and always collecting. And that's definitely part of like that Google brand of the Google cloud and all that. But it's, I don't know if you've been following Samantha Guthrie at all. It's a really weird conversation of yes, you value your security, but where's the line? And you know, making fear a reason people purchase a product is also not necessarily the greatest feeling as a consumer. It starts to feel like a chore and is not something that you love about a brand. It's just something you feel like you have to have. So there's just a lot of mixed feelings about your personal security, other people's rights. You know, they called out the founder also called out, know, how they used ring in the Brown school shooting that happened a couple of months ago. So like, yes, that's a huge positive that they were able to do that. But, you know, In the case of Savannah Guthrie, all we know is they took the camera off the door, didn't really do anything else other than that. So just a mixed bag. And I think we're still all trying to navigate it. But in the meantime, Ring has been pretty positive and pretty proactive.

Mark Vandegrift
I think that video of the guy going up to the door with the boxing gloves. If that's not the most played video this year, I'll be shocked. I mean, just watching the news, you see it a thousand times because they just keep it on loop. But my goodness that yeah, that's the funny. It's kind of sad of what's happened, but it's kind of funny that the way the guy approaches the or the girl, I don't know, approaches the door and sticks the boxing glove up there. It's just weird.

Mercedes Brown
Yes. I know, and again, it goes back to like the only if this were a Ring camera, they'd only ever have that information if she was paying as a subscriber. So it's just a lot of questions about like, how much do you really care about people's safety if we have to pay if we, you know, just all these questions. And so it'll be a little bit of a stew for them to sort through what they're going to do next, how they're going to innovate their product without scaring people and all of that.

Mark Vandegrift
Well, not to put you on the spot, but I'm going to put you on the spot. So if they called us up today and said, we need you to handle our PR going forward, what would be a couple recommendations you would make to them? This will be informative for our audience and how to deal with crisis communications, I think.

Mercedes Brown
Yeah, I think if anything, I would maybe instead of having, I mean, the founder's pretty well versed in, you know, I think he's comes from the tech world. He's not necessarily a business guy first and foremost, but if you had maybe people in the backend about actually discussing how the technology works from maybe that expert point of view of who's actually running the tech behind the scenes, that might be another good point. I  think messaging wise, my biggest critique would be when you initially are announcing ads or initially, you know, just talking about your product, you should be a lot more clear about that opt in, opt out conversation and less about this is going to magically happen on your ring. I think if that had been addressed in the ad, if you had been more precise with your language, then people wouldn't have been so freaked out and you wouldn't have to go and backtrack and explain all these opt in, opt out. If you listen to them explaining it online, it kind of seems a little confusing. They have like a message board and the message board like messages you and you're like, okay, I don't even understand what any of looks like. So I just think those, that connection of just what is actually occurring, that transparency first and foremost would have been a lot easier than just saying this is going to auto detect a dog because that's how it reads in all the current communications.

Mark Vandegrift 
Well, that's good segue because we have this technology that's pervasive in our lives. And that's one thing. The other is obviously AI. And I think one other topic that might be worth discussing that we haven't put in an AI context are the AI generated ads. So Coke ran a couple just this past year. And I know of other ads where I think most of the Super Bowl, we always called them CGI, so computer generated, but the capability to create those ads quickly now because of the computing power is so significant that they can do these site gags and they can do things that probably aren't physically possible. Like there were a lot of talking animals, for instance, and I know some of these movies like Zootopia and Zootopia 2 are coming out much faster because of the computing power. But from a PR perspective, what are you seeing online about the chatter and AI produced ads?

Mercedes Brown
I think one thing to start this conversation off for our audience and you if you're not necessarily operating in the marketing and PR world like we are, the vast, the big difference ultimately between advertising and PR is really that third party credential that you receive via human relationships. So what we're focusing on is not paid conversations or paid campaigns, but the real relationship behind a brand and its consumers and its constituents. So, you know, anything from the people who purchase it to the internal employees to people who just are perceiving the brand. All of those are important relationships to a brand. What that speaks to is really our human value on relationships and where we actually place our trust is firsthand experience. And with that, you know, AI does not lend itself to having anything that feels real or tangible or connective to people. I think right now there's just so much chatter about it. It's like, look how cool, like shiny new object that we can do all this cool stuff. But what brands realize is you're pumping energy, you know, stripping away resources from other individuals perhaps to do the work themselves. But also you're taking away the greatest value that ads or PR touch points can have, which is hitting at the heartstrings and that emotional connection to a person. Especially now, if you're trying to reach younger generations who are much more self-aware about what is AI or CGI or fake or much more skeptical about fraudulent messaging or even anything that's overly promotional. Using AI is probably the worst tactic you could go about because generally, you know, nowadays because there's so much of that and so much is digital, people really prize reality. Like that experiential touch, that human touch is becoming, you know, creme de la creme of experience and touch points for brands. So now if you really want to be novel, it's best to do it organic if you want that lasting impression in the human psyche.

Mark Vandegrift 
Interesting. So are you seeing any chatter online of, I'm sick of these AI generated ads. you know, I'm tired of these brands coming at me with, ads that are generated by computers. What are you seeing from online chatter or articles?

Mercedes Brown 
Yeah, I don't know if you've heard this term yet, but this is like the term that it's already been in the works, but has become even more mainstream, which is like AI slop. Like that is how people think about it. It's true. Like if you look online, the conversation, TikTok, Twitter, Instagram, comments are constantly like so tired of this AI slop, so tired of my feed. Everything is overrun with AI. So then to put it on the mainstream and put it on, you know, a brand like the Super Bowl it is just like, thanks for giving us more of what we already saw. So really that AI slop term is the pervasive conversation on the internet. It's like eye roll moment. No one's interested in your AI slop. Sorry. It's not that cool. Yeah, I think the funny thing is, I think I saw there was a Gucci ad that used, you know, AI. It's like when you're a luxury brand, why would you pick AI or like H&M or, you know, there's so many brands attempting to use it if it's partial, if it's the whole ad. And what encapsulates that conversation is the term AI slop.

Mark Vandegrift 
Yeah, I think the pressure for brands to respond to the moment and then the speed at which they want to generate ads to that moment is the temptation. I mean, the cost is obviously much cheaper than going out, hiring a film crew, writing a script, paying talent, etc. So I kind of get that. Do you think we'll find a balance in there where there's a moment that happens like when you're watching the Olympics and it seems like an hour or two hours after the person wins the gold, they have that little clip within the ad, right? Now that's easy to develop because you can develop most of the spot ahead of time and then just grab the footage from the Olympics, drop it in and you're good. But do you think that it has to do with the speed at which we need to capture the moment and make our brand relevant to that moment.

Mercedes Brown
I think that is a huge part of it. We are moving at hyper speed, um, constantly these days. I mean, turning around anything to respond to something is a matter of almost sometimes less than 24 hours to do anything these days. So yes, I do think there's a lot of pressure to respond, um, and also to cut costs. So that is a huge part of why brands definitely feel the pressure to use the AI. And at least for some, if you're really good at sculpting with AI generators, then like you can produce things that look you know, kind of pretty good, like the Coke ad, like, you know, I can't make that with AI. I'm going to be honest. If I was in charge of the generator, don't put me in charge of it. It will look like crap. But so I guess it's its own talent, but yeah, definitely there is that pressure. But I would hope that as someone who believes in the power of free market economics, that eventually the demand is going to be for brands that stand out. I mean, we're positionists. That's what we're about, differentiation, the differentiation that will probably come because everything in life is a pendulum is going to be homemade, handcrafted ads. So, you know, that quality over quantity maybe if it isn't necessarily something that's, you know, might be a little bit more low budget in terms of traditional film but might be more valued in the eye of the perceiver. So, I just think that's naturally how the market will go eventually. It'll pendulum back.

Mark Vandegrift
Well, that's good insight. I mean, when you think about even consumer habits right now, we've all pushed back against the Chinese trinkets and trash and we're looking for homemade goods. If you go to a local craft show, I think most people would say attendance is up. They're selling more, you know, there's a thousand potters and there's a thousand artists and there's a thousand photographers at each one of these and they all seem to be doing well. And I think that's the value of wanting homemade, handcrafted goods and how that translates into even the marketing that we consume.

Mercedes Brown 
Right. Because the whole thing, I mean, from the product, the end result to all of the branding and perception we build around it is all one cohesive story. So ultimately, yes, those are all going to have to fall in line with one another. And I see that just in like what you were already mentioning, like people hate SHEIN and people hate Amazon. You know, this is, this is the trend right now. So despite the influx and AI ads, the customer perception is always going to move like a couple steps above. And so as a PR professional, you have to read the chess move going on there to inform the, you know, what we're going to do with the story behind us.

Mark Vandegrift 
That's great insight. Well, we don't want to finish this episode without a little bit of risque news.

Mercedes Brown 
Yeah.

Mark Vandegrift 
So I know you want to talk about Frida Baby, like you're dying to talk about it.

Mercedes Brown 
I know it's just so weird. I was like, oh my gosh, I was cringing. I could not like, I, you know, I don't have kids, but if you out there are at all aware of what this brand is, Frida Baby, basically they're most, they're best known for like postpartum and like pre and like natal care products. So like the snot sucker, like the things that are not glamorous about having children, you know, ultimately like their branding is that they take those raw parent moments and are very honest about them and try to make it lighthearted. That's what they go for. If you're at all clued into like Instagram influencers and like mommy influencers and all that, this is a very popular brand that's used in, you know, they have a postpartum care kit that's like already pre-made with all the stuff you need or like baby essentials kits. So they do all that kind of stuff to make that transition easier. So very popular with mom influencers. So they've sold tons of units. It's right now probably the name brand in that category for parent, parent goods. But they're in trouble or under fire recently. Cause some people started realizing that their marketing was a little sexual for talking about babies. Like most of their products are literally baby products using really inappropriate lines. Kind of like, how about a quickie in relation to like the snot thing, but like it's not that it's just like really bizarre. And honestly, there's more graphic lines that you could Google yourself that people were kind of like, hey, is anyone noticing all this weird, like innuendos being used on this packaging marketing? They had a social media campaign that was all centered around these sexual innuendos and attributing them to their products. And people were kind of like, you know, we understand like the lighthearted raw parenting, but like, what does this have to do with my newborn baby? 

Mark Vandegrift 
Right.

Mercedes Brown 
Yeah. And I think what's weird, the company's Swedish. I don't know. Maybe Europeans are weird. No offense to them, but you know, I don't know. Maybe to our American sensibilities, it's just a little bit, you know, we're still a little bit more puritanical than that. Please keep that over there. I don't know. Parents are upset and boycotting the brand. Obviously right now there's a petition because people would like to have them investigated by the advertising council, as well as I think the FTC is who they're trying to get them investigated for. So they have not been, they've not reached the number of signatures needed to accomplish that. However, it is a common boycott right now on the internet for moms. And the other crazy thing is, my gosh, I'm blanking now. I just had this other thought about Frida baby, but yeah, so it's kinda, it's quite gross and it's quite, Ah, this is what it is, this is something in PR that was kind of weird. They released a statement naturally most brands will at least release a statement about what happened and they didn't apologize. They were kind of like, this is what we do. So they did remove all the content from the campaign, the advertising campaign that accompanied it, but they did not apologize. They were kind of like, this is how we talk. And if you don't like it, you can figure it out basically. Yeah. So I'll be so curious how other brands respond. There's no other legal action right now other than the boycott. But if another one rises up to take its place as a more family-friendly option, that would be glamorous.

Mark Vandegrift 
That's just being completely blind, I guess, ignoring like child trafficking issues that we see in the world and just sensitive topics. Like I get there's a ton of brands that it's all sexual. I mean, there's tons of sexual advertising, right? That's sex sells, but with babies and mothers in their, I guess, most precious moments with their babies to be going that route. I don't know. Seems inappropriate, I'm not their target audience either.

Mercedes Brown
And I think there's better ways to go like, I think there's better ways though to be lighthearted like kind of similar to Ring and like talking about that precise messaging like there really was no double check about that perception like you bring up like the child trafficking that's a huge deal that Sound of Freedom movie came out a couple years ago and whether or not people are into Angel Studios movies that movie was a success for a reason so when you're talking about the demographic of people who are raising young kids who might be afraid of the future, I don't it's just weird and  at the end of the day it is inappropriate you know, that kind of content, you know, there are some brands who are playful in that way, whether they produce sex related projects, products or not, and that's their prerogative. If you're in a more consumer category to, you know, like Sabrina Carpenter is kind of of that where she kind of plays into that heavily, but she's not selling like baby lullaby music. So like, I think people are less concerned.

Mark Vandegrift 
Pringles?

Mercedes Brown 
Yeah, not yet. Who knows? You know, but I just think it's a bit, it's an overstep for the brand. Like no one really, you know, I think there's a lot of things that kind of have less standards. We're way less strict about a lot of things socially these days, but this was too far for sure. And people were not into it.

Mark Vandegrift
So your response would have been apologize, like a heartfelt apology, and then modify your advertising going forward.

Mercedes Brown 
Yes, yes. And that would include rebranding their packaging because it's on their packaging. So yeah, it's on their packaging. Not majorly, it gets mostly on the sides and whatnot, but even their instructions are kind of embedded with some of that language, which is really bizarre. Yeah, it's weird. So just total rebrand. I mean, yes, they differentiate from other baby products. Like it's like, it's not focused on like cutesy baby. It's more focused on, it's supposed to be focused on the parent experience. But I think there's a way better way, tactile way to do that than saying going straight for sex. Like it's kind of like saying is that really all we can think about as a society? Like that's all we can go to.

Mark Vandegrift 
Unbelievable. Well, that was a good one to finish with. I'm sure listeners are going to follow up on that one and keep tabs on it. We will have you back for an update here soon on that. But thanks for joining us today, Merce. And thank you for our audience joining the Brand Shorthand podcast. If you haven't liked, subscribed, shared, told your friend, please do. And until next time, have an amazing day.