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It’s no secret in newsrooms that if you put the word “sex” or “sexy” in your headline, the story will get more clicks. Sex sells and how! Yet, conservatism rules in media and few editors would cross the line. While media has generally played shy, advertisers have often flirted with risqué copy to grab eyeballs, but nobody has been quite as bold as food search and delivery website Zomato. It recently served innuendo laden banners on Internet’s naughtiest sites. The logic was simple — advertising on porn sites was far cheaper and the returns far better. Average cost per click (CPC) on porn sites is ₹2, one tenth of what it costs to pay for Google Adwords and Facebook Ads. From a user perspective, India ranks No. 5 in terms of most daily visitors to PornHub (the world’s biggest porn site network).
A week into the advertising, as the click through data poured in, Zomato executives were patting themselves on their backs for a marvellously ingenious idea. And the delicious returns. Until the social media backlash began. How could Zomato support the porn industry? How could it put out such tasteless ads? How could a food brand indulge in unpalatable activities? The inevitable happened. Zomato decided to stop advertising on porn sites. As founder and CEO Deepinder Goyal said, “We sensed we crossed the fine line between marketing irreverence and cultural insensitivity”.
Now begins the debate. Was Zomato right in backtracking? In the cut throat world of startups, the RoI generated seemed to justify their move. And as many felt, if Indians were visiting porn sites in such high numbers, they should be able to stomach a brand moving in that direction too.
However, Zomato has done right to reverse its steps. Sex sells, but image matters more. Zomato might have gained eyeballs and monies in the short term, but the long-term impact on its brand name would have been lethal. Brand associations after all stay for a long time in public memory. And serving ads on porn sites could lead to bitter aftertastes.
Chitra Narayanan Editorial Consultant
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