NEW DELHI: Global beverage giant Coca-Cola will be pausing all paid advertising across social media platforms globally for a minimum of 30 days, adding to a growing list of companies protesting against the mishandling of hate speech online.
“Starting on July 1, the Coca-Cola Company will pause paid advertising on all social media platforms globally for at least 30 days,” a statement from CEO James Quincey said.
“There is no place for racism in the world and there is no place for racism on social media. We will take this time to reassess our advertising standards and policies to determine whether revisions are needed internally, and what more we should expect of our social media partners to rid the platforms of hate, violence and inappropriate content. We will let them know we expect greater accountability, action and transparency from them,” he added.
Over the last few weeks, a host of civil rights organizations like the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the Anti-Defamation League have been pushing organisations to put their financial weight behind a Facebook boycott because the social media platform continues to allow hateful and harmful content on their sites.
Coca-Cola joins the like of Unilever, the company behind brands such as Dove and Lipton, which had earlier said, “...given the polarized atmosphere in the U.S., we have decided that starting now through at least the end of the year, we’ll not run brand advertising in social media newsfeed platforms Facebook, Instagram and Twitter in the U.S.” Color of Change, one of the groups backing the boycott, said that nearly 100 advertisers have joined the campaign including Honda, the chocolate brand Hershey and Levi’s.
Hershey’s also announced that it will be cutting spending on Facebook and Instagram by a third for the rest of the year and joining the #stophateforprofit boycott. Procter & Gamble, another major ad spender, is also reviewing all media channels, networks and platforms where it advertises but has not yet announced that it will join this campaign.
Facebook, on its part, announced tweaks to a number of its policies around hate speech and voter suppression this week.
“The policies we're implementing today are designed to address the reality of the challenges our country is facing and how they are showing up across our community," CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote on his Facebook page. The measures, however, have done little to quieten the wave of companies pulling advertising from the platform.
Globally, Facebook makes about 98 per cent of its $70bn in annual revenue from advertising. Both Unilever and Coca Cola are among the biggest advertisers in the world, with the former spending about $8.2 billion in 2019 on “brand and marketing investment,” according to the company’s annual report. Statista estimates Coca-Cola ad spends worldwide at an average of $4 billion in 2019.