You know what they say – there is no smoke without any fire, and hence, we were surprised to come across news that a bunch of companies have decided to pull their campaigns from social network Facebook after discovering that their ads have begun to appear right next to offensive photos and posts. It looks like there is still some ways for Facebook to go before they are able to leverage on their massive user base, and while I am quite sure that Google has had their fair share of mistakes in the past, certainly something like this does not happen too often among Google ads – although I am open to correction.
Apparently, the Financial Times has reported that both Nissan and U.K.-based Nationwide are two of several firms who have removed their ads from Facebook, after realizing that those ads appeared next to misogynistic content. Other brands like Dove have not taken such a route just yet, but will be working alongside Facebook in order to fix up this particular issue. Nissan spokesperson David Reuter did share that Nissan intends to work alongside Facebook to opt out of placing ads on pages with offensive content. What has Facebook done in the face of such controversy? Well, they mentioned in a statement, “We have been working over the past several months to improve our systems to respond to reports of violations, but the guidelines used by these systems have failed to capture all the content that violates our standards. We need to do better – and we will.”
Is it me or do companies find it so difficult to issue a simple apology when they have made a mistake?