Tree Pareidolia
This advertisement from IHOP’s certified Twitter account was taken down within hours of posting, and the company released an apology within two hours that read:
“Earlier today we tweeted something dumb and immature that does not reflect what IHOP stands for. We’re sorry.”
Referring to pancakes as flat is a perfectly normal claim. Applying personification to food is also commonplace in the social media marketing industry, as it lends a humorous personality to an otherwise boring corporate marketing campaign. The copywriter behind the post likely had innocent intentions and came up with this post using the same process he or she used for hundreds of other posts before it. However, this is a perfect example of a tasteless social media faux pas that created a severe backlash that did more harm than good to the brand’s public image.
The post itself personifies tastelessness more than anything else. By pairing a highly suggestive image with incredibly offensive copy, IHOP effectively told the world that they find misogyny humourous. The brand received the negative backlash of the highly sensitive collective voice of the Internet within minutes and business likely suffered accordingly. As far as I’m concerned, they deserved every inch of animosity they had thrown at them because of this blatant display of idiocy. And as a social media marketer myself, I’m offended that someone allowed this to be posted on an account as large as IHOP’s.
