Issue Identification In August of 2007, Intel made the news for ad that they release. The ad made the news due to that consumer found to be an offensive ad. In the ad that Consumers found to be offensive, it was to promote the next generation of Intel Core 2 Duo processors. The ad, had a Caucasian man all dressed in business attire standing in the middle of an office area surround by a group of African American sprinters.
The way that the ad was laid out it was found to be racially offensive. Before the ad was distributed, Intel was able to pull the ad from American publications.Intel wasn’t able to stop most of the ads from getting printed up but the Dell’s catalog had printed the ad. Due to the fact that they were unable to stop the distribution of the ad through Dells Catalog, Intel was widely considered to be racist. Background Intel is perhaps one of the most famous and recognized corporation on the planet due to them being the computer chip maker for most of your home computers and laptops.
Intel was highly respectable and was always in the news for their computer chip but in 2007 that all changed when the racial ad was printed up. Intel was going for a different approach with that ad.At the top of the ad, there was a slogan which read: “Multiply computer performance and maximize the power of your employees. ” It was to convey a point certain point about their new processor that could improve the performance of an employee computer and maximize productivity but it wasn’t viewed in the way that they intended it to be viewed. At first, they saw nothing wrong with the image, until it was too late.
The ad agency that produced the ad would not say whether blame for the ad was being laid at the feet of the ad agency or Intel (Poeter, ChannelWeb). Impact of the IssueEven though the ad was to convey a point about their new Core 2 processor, it was not viewed to in the way that it was intended to be view. Since there was a Caucasian male surrounded by what it seems to be African Americans males bowing down to this Caucasian male, it was originally intended to: "convey the performance capabilities of our processors through a number of visual metaphors," Don MacDonald, director of global marketing for the company, wrote. Well unfortunately it was not perceived that way. Well since Intel had made this mistake, it had forced the company to make an pology and explain their reasoning and intentions for the ad. Well Intel had stated on their apology that was posted on their website, “this ad of using African-American sprinters did not deliver our intended message and in fact proved to be culturally insensitive and insulting.
” Well since the ad was printed, Intel has had to deal with the backlash of the ads, sales for the processor had decreased and for the first time they were not the number one distributor for computer chips around the work (Richards, Times Online UK). Recommendation/Personal PerspectiveAs going through the different articles I was reading on the issue, it was as if Intel was excited to be announcing their new processor but was unable to see anything wrong with the advertisement at the time of publication until it was too late. It is good to get excited over the development of a new product that can increase computing power but at the same time you need to still be aware about your actions. Everyone in the world see the world through their eye and their experiences so you need to be aware that people are going to see things in a different view.
One thing that I would recommend is when you are working on your advertisement for a new product or an existing product; make sure you come up with an idea and critic the idea with a group or team. When you have all agreed on the concept, come up with a mock up of the idea. When the mock up is complete then bring in a whole new set of people and have them tell you what they feel about your idea and if there is anything that they feel that you need to changed. When you have their feedback then starts to work on the changes and work your way up to a finish project.
When the final project is complete I would again bring in a group of people and have them give you their impression of the ad and see if there is anything that they feel need to change. With this way, you are going to get many view and yah it may cost a little more but besides that’s it will insure that you are not going to offend majority of the people. One thing that people also need to know is that you are not always going to please everyone out there. Work Citied Richards, Jonathan.
Intel Apologizes for 'Racist' Computer Ad. ” Times Online UK August 3, 2007. <http://technology. timesonline.
co. uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article2192554. ece> Poeter, Damon. “Intel Apologizes For 'Insulting' Ad; Critics Charge Racial Insensitivity.
” ChannelWeb August 01, 2007. <http://www. crn. com/hardware/201202249;jsessionid=AGSI1OCWRF2YGQSNDLRSKH0CJUNN2JVN> MacDonald, Don.
“Apologies from Intel for Sprinter Ad” Intel August 2007. <http://www. intel. com/news/sprintad. htm? iid=homepage+news_sprinta
