Blame is an underused lever in advertising. Not because it's uncomfortable — though it can be — but because most brands don't really consider it. Blame clarifies. It assigns responsibility and shifts perception in ways that rational argument rarely manages. Here are six creative tactics from the Emotion Engine that know exactly where to aim.
- Redirect the Blame
- Absorb the Blame First
- Make Blame Visible
- Mirror Blame Back to Reality
- Transfer the Blame
- Remove the Blame
1. Redirect the Blame
Give the audience a scapegoat — and make the brand that scapegoat willingly.
Blame It on Interflora — Interflora, Brandhouse, 2016
Forgetful men face a problem every February: they've missed Valentine's Day, and someone is going to pay for it — most likely them. Interflora Denmark solved this by offering to deliver a gift the day after, accompanied by a card claiming the delay was entirely Interflora's fault. Men got to choose from a list of fictional excuses — a strike at the Dutch border, hungry green caterpillars eating the roses — and the blame transferred cleanly from partner to florist. The campaign launched through digital targeting at men and spread rapidly through social. Both sides loved it: the man escaped blame, the partner got a gift with a story, and Interflora sold a significant volume of otherwise-lost Valentine's business.
2. Absorb the Blame First
Step into the line of fire before it reaches you — and let the real culprit take the hit.
#StopAbusiveShipping — Mercado Livre, REF+, 2018
When Brazil's national postal service Correios announced a 51% hike in shipping costs, the question for ecommerce platform Mercado Livre was simple: who would its customers blame? Rather than wait to find out, Mercado Livre sent a message to all its sellers asking them to stick protest labels — #FreteAbusivoNão (#StopAbusiveShipping) — on every package going out through Correios. The post office, which held a monopoly, became the unwitting vehicle for a campaign against itself. The protest resulted in a temporary injunction blocking the price change. When prices rose anyway and Mercado Livre's share price dipped, its customers already knew it wasn't them who were responsible. See campaign ->
3. Make Blame Visible
Expose who is actually responsible by putting the evidence in front of an audience that has been looking the other way.
Don't Blame the Clothes — The Womanity Foundation, JWT, 2018
The brief was to dismantle victim-blaming in sexual violence cases — specifically, the idea that a woman's clothing bears any responsibility for assault. JWT and the Womanity Foundation didn't debate the point. They displayed clothing items similar to those worn by survivors during their assaults: school uniforms, children's pyjamas, jeans, sweaters. The exhibition, active in Bangkok in 2018, made a single visual argument — that no specific attire invites rape — without a word of persuasion. The contrast between the mundanity of the clothes and the gravity of what they represented did all the work. The campaign was designed to push back against both public and judicial tendencies to blame victims, and shifted the frame entirely: from what she was wearing to who was responsible. See campaign ->
