OPPO 翻车了：一句话让高管降两级

Today we're talking about a news story — about an ad.

About a phone company.

The company is called OPPO.

Have you heard of it?

It's a major Chinese company that has been making phones for many years.

Lots of people in China buy them.

Recently, OPPO got into big trouble.

Here's what happened.

May 10 was Mother's Day.

You know Mother's Day, right?

It's the holiday for moms — celebrated all around the world.

As Mother's Day was approaching,

OPPO wanted to make an ad —

an ad about moms.

They partnered with a magazine.

The magazine is called Sanlian Lifeweek —

a very famous magazine.

Together they made a poster.

The poster had a paragraph on it.

The paragraph went like this:

"My mom has two 'husbands.'

One is my dad.

The other she sees twice a year.

When she goes out with my dad, she basically doesn't dress up.

When she sees the other one, she'd practically wear a wedding gown."

OPPO thought this paragraph was clever.

Why?

Let me explain.

"The other husband"

isn't real.

It's a celebrity.

A celebrity that Mom likes.

What's a celebrity?

A famous person.

Singers, actors.

Lots of people love them.

Now, many moms

also like celebrities.

Just like young people.

Some moms go to two concerts a year.

They dress beautifully.

They go to see the idol they love.

What OPPO was trying to say is:

moms today are different from moms in the past.

They have their own interests too.

They're still young inside.

They're still fun.

But people online

totally didn't see it that way.

They got angry.

Furious.

Why?

First reason:

"Two husbands" — that phrase alone sounds wrong.

Mom only has one husband, and that's Dad.

Saying "two" carries a bad meaning.

Second reason:

Not dressing up for Dad, but dressing up for a celebrity —

that's saying Mom doesn't love Dad.

Anyone can see it.

Third reason:

Tomorrow is Mother's Day.

How can you talk about Mom this way today?

You should say Mom is the best,

not crack jokes about Mom.

Lots of people scolded OPPO online; lots of moms scolded too.

Social media was on fire.

OPPO saw this and took down the ad.

Then they posted a short apology.

But people were still angry.

They felt OPPO's apology was too light.

More like an explanation than a real apology.

The next day, May 10, was Mother's Day itself.

The China Advertising Association spoke up.

What is the China Advertising Association?

It's a national organization that oversees ads.

Normally they don't publicly call out specific companies.

But this time they issued a public statement.

The statement said:

ads cannot mock family.

Ads cannot make jokes about marriage.

Ads should respect mothers,

should respect family,

should have limits.

This put serious pressure on OPPO.

By May 11,

OPPO put out another apology.

This one was much heavier than the first.

What's more, OPPO did one more big thing.

They punished several executives.

And they made the punishment list public.

Publishing a punishment list itself is very rare.

The biggest one was the head of OPPO China.

His name is Duan Yaohui.

He was demoted by two levels.

His salary was frozen for 36 months —

that's three years.

Another department head was named Wang Yi.

He was demoted one level, salary frozen for a year.

The PR head, Ma Xin, also had his salary frozen for a year.

And a project lead was demoted one level too.

People who know this industry said:

this is the harshest punishment in OPPO's history.

Why so harsh?

Let me give a few reasons.

First,

this incident made the whole country angry.

Not just a few people — tens of millions.

Second,

the day it happened was right before Mother's Day.

The whole country was thinking about moms.

Cracking jokes about moms then — nobody could stand it.

Third,

another university also spoke up — Wuhan University.

They publicly said OPPO was wrong,

that this ad had crossed the line.

A university publicly calling out a company is very rare.

So this incident's impact was unusually large.

OPPO also got the message.

They said: "Our content review process had problems.

We'll fix it. We'll build a stricter review mechanism."

So that's the story of this incident.

Lastly, a few thoughts.

This story tells us:

writing ads is hard.

Especially ads about family.

You want to be creative,

you want to be memorable —

that's fine.

But you can't cross the line.

What does "crossing the line" mean?

Saying something you shouldn't say.

Stepping past the line in everyone's heart.

A lot of companies,

to be memorable,

want to say something outrageous.

But "outrageous" also has limits.

You can't make jokes about Mom.

You can't make jokes about marriage.

I hope future ads

will respect ordinary people more.

And be warmer.

OK.

Today's OPPO Mother's Day story ends here.

We'll talk about other things tomorrow.