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Salesgenie Criticized Over Super Bowl Ads


Cultural sensitivity not its strong point

In the history of Super Bowl ads, there were those that got forgotten as soon as the game resumed.  There were those that got mentioned around the water cooler.  And then there were those that got a company called racist.  For examples of this last group, you can look to Salesgenie.com.

Of course, if you'd rather not give the company the traffic, there's plenty to see at YouTube and the various sites that are protesting the commercials.  Or you can search for Salesgenie on Google and click on its sponsored ad.  We're not saying you should, but it's another option, anyway.Salesgenie Criticized Over Super Bowl Ads

Back to the hubbub, then (and actually, if you used Google just now, you're already in the right place).  The sixth, eighth, ninth, and tenth results for Salesgenie's name relate to its Super Bowl ads.

Jason Calacanis's article is named, simply enough, "SalesGenie racist super bowl commercial."  Hee-Haw Marketing chips in with "The Bigger Sales Genie Blunder."  A Portfolio.com story then discusses "SalesGenie's Tasteless, 'Racist' Super Bowl Ad," and FanHouse runs the title "Worst Super Bowl Commercial: Sales Genie."

Now, the Portfolio.com article points out that Salesgenie's CEO, Vin Gupta, is Indian, and it was Gupta who wrote the ads featuring both Indian and Chinese characters.  Also, Gupta wasn't exactly trying to make tasteful masterpieces, and not everyone who saw the commercials was offended.

Still, it's hard not to wonder what sort of new-customers-to-social-stigma ratio Salesgenie has encountered.  We hope Gupta will at least share the first half of that statistic.

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About the author:
Doug is a staff writer for WebProNews. Visit WebProNews for the latest eBusiness news.

Comments

Bromell, Mike is severe racist.

<a href="http://youtube.com/watch?v=73rb92On5TE">Mike Bromell</a> = racist.  MJB marketing employs one of the most racist people to ever leave a message on an answering machine

Gupta!

It's good to know that the CEO is Indian. That certainly makes it seem less racist. I, being 26, don't see anything particularly racist, except maybe the stereotype of Indians having lots of children, but I mostly saw it as an increase in how much the job loss would affect him. Nothing negative, in my opinion, was said about any cultures. Then again, people my age didn't grow up around much racism to recognize it, either.

The pandas, I took as just being pandas. I didn't recognize any Chinese stereotypes at all with them. Maybe some Chinese decoration, but that's only good design.

Basically, I saw a couple less-than-interesting commercials that happened to star an Indian guy and some pandas.

Lazy

How lazy must you be to complain about "making us copy/paste their url"? Don't sprain your index finger there, buddy.

I thought it was stupid not

I thought it was stupid not to link to the site as well, you go on about not wanting to give the site traffic yet you write a blog about the site which entices everyones curiousity about it. lol STUPID

oh just link to the site,

oh just link to the site, instead of making us copy/paste their url. And to insinute for us to view their ppc ads as a way to view their site is just plain childish.

not racist

I thought it was realistic.  Everybody knows pandas need free reeds.

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