Belo Men Ad: 10% Lighter, 100% MORE Sosyal

Belo Men, a line of skin whitening products for men, recently unveiled a series of advertisements, including one which has the caption “10% lighter. 100% more sosyal,” showing a young man throwing the keys to his car to a valet.

Other executions are: “10% lighter. 100% approved,” with an elderly man showing off his future son-in-law to his golf buddies; and “10% lighter. 100% more numbers,” with a guy surrounded by three sexy girls, holding their cellphones.

Belo Ad: Similar to BAYO

Filipino netizens were once offended by a similar campaign by BAYO. It turned out that the campaign has 3 phases with the intention of celebrating nationality, heritage and personality mix. The said ad has mobilized the netizens to create memes which made the infamous ad viral and popular. While I personally didn’t find the said ad offensive, I think the company has done a good job in handling the social media disaster. The Belo ad, however, is a cheap attempt to gain the same virality.

Negative Advertising: Cheap Yet Effective Way to Attract Attention

Negative ads are not popular but they usually get the most attention. People are usually often attracted to messages that provokes feelings like anger and fear. Banking on the fact that negative advertising works, the advertising firm behind the Belo ad thought it would be a good idea to offend Filipinos with an issue that’s close to our hearts.

Belo Group Apologizes for the Skin Whitening Ad

“If a lot of people are getting offended about it, we apologize about that. But it wasn’t our intention,” Belo’s daughter Cristalle Henares said in an interview with ABS-CBNnews.com on Sunday night.

“And it’s not really about the sosyal. That was just the execution. The idea behind it is as they get whiter, they became more confident,” she explained.

Belo added that in her 22 years of medical practice, she noticed that skin whitening is the most popular procedure asked by their customers.

“And men have always been looking for something for them,” she said.

This is why Belo came out with a whitening product specifically for men.

“They don’t want to be really white but they just want to be fairer kasi sabi nila parang mas clear ang complexion, parang they feel more confident. So I told Cristalle before pa na i think you need to make a whitening product for men, for them lang talaga,” the doctor said.

“I gave in to what they want. That’s (skin whitening) the No. 1 talaga na hinihingi sa clinic, both men and women,” she added.

Henares added that Belo Men as a brand has a more humorous personality — which she said was reflected in the series of ads.

The other executions are: “10% lighter. 100% approved,” with an elderly man showing off his future son-in-law to his golf buddies; and “10% lighter. 100% more numbers,” with a guy surrounded by three sexy girls, holding their cellphones.

“These are just ways to make the subject a little lighter because men are medyo nahihiya sila about the topic. But from what we know in the clinic, that’s really what they want to happen. …Para hindi siya diretso, we had to make it a little more humorous,” Henares said.

“Actually it was planned before the whole Bayo thing happened. Nagkataon lang na medyo sabay ang launch namin. And when the Bayo thing happened, we said, ‘Oh no, because of the percentages, people might think that they have the same connotation. So when the Bayo thing happened, we said why don’t we lay low for now. So we put it down first sa Facebook. And we released it in just one magazine, which is FHM,” she explained.

But with the negative reaction on social media, Henares said they will decide on what to do with the campaign.

“If we feel that it’s a sensitive topic right now, we’re going to park it a bit and see where it goes,” Henares said.

The formula continues: Negative message + Cheap Humor + Apology = Brand awareness

What do you think of the ad? Let us know through the comments below!