BAME Representation in Advertising Must Ensure BAME People Are Actively Involved in the Creation Process
Brands need to ensure they are appealing to BAME consumers in an authentic way to prevent them from feeling like their inclusion is ‘tokenistic’
While inclusivity in advertising is undeniably important, if a demographic is represented poorly, rather than presenting a brand as forward-thinking and inclusive, it can backfire and alienate an audience. According to integrated marketing agency, Mediareach, brands need to ensure that the representation goes further than simply having BAME people in campaigns and seek to actively include them in their creation.
Saad Al-Saraf, CEO at Mediareach, stated: “A study from 2018 found that 34% of black people in the UK felt that people of their ethnicity were inaccurately depicted in advertising, with 29% feeling that they were negatively portrayed. Similarly, 30% of Asian people thought that they were also represented inaccurately in advertising. The same study found that only 9% of white people thought that they were inaccurately depicted.
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“This issue may stem from the fact that only 7% of adverts feature BAME groups as dominant or main characters and 60% of ads feature only, or majority, white people. This leaves less on-screen opportunity for BAME people to be portrayed in a nuanced or varied way.”
Simple mistakes can make a BIG difference and quickly put off BAME audiences. When BAME audiences feel that the advertiser hasn’t done enough research about their particular background or culture, they can feel alienated by the attempt to reach out to them.
A qualitative study from Lloyds pointed out a one-size-fits-all approach can cause issues. “When BAME groups were included in advertising, they were often shown with very little cultural difference and instead were regularly shown immersed in Western culture, e.g., sat together having Christmas dinner. There seemed to be little attention paid to specific cultural heritage,” the study said.
Transport For London’s diversity in advertising competition promised £500,000 worth of free advertising across their network for a campaign that challenged stereotypical representations of BAME groups and provided an “authentic” portrayal. The winner was lingerie brand Nubian Skin, which specialises in making “n***” colour underwear and bras that match a variety of darker skin tones.
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Their Founder and Chief Executive, Ade Hassan MBE, explained how her campaign sought to make black people feel included and noticed in advertising. “N*** is such an important colour in lingerie. But as a black woman, I could never find my ‘n***’ as it was always beige,” she said. “We want to bring a smile to people, especially black people when they see a campaign that doesn’t feature a token black person but is truly representative of us.”
Al-Saraf added: “One of the key areas to look at is representation within your creative workforce. A recent report found that ethnic diversity within advertising agencies is at its highest recorded level but found that 97% of chair level positions such as Chief Executives and Managing Directors are held by white people, with only 1.9% being from a BAME background.
This might be a trickier issue to tackle in the short term, however, examining your company’s wider creative strategy and taking into account the decision-makers may not have the necessary, in-depth knowledge to market and appeal to BAME audiences in an authentic way, could help to make a difference. Being open to the idea that your creative strategies and diversity goals can always be improved upon is a great place to start.
“Brands like Nubian Skin demonstrate how a diverse campaign should be done in the right way. Their ads wanted to improve the quality of representation of BAME people and ensure they were front and centre of their campaign. A well-done campaign should focus on the quality of BAME portrayal and should ensure that their inclusion doesn’t feel tokenistic,” concluded Al-Saraf.
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