Celebrity advertising has recently produced a fresh run of controversies involving Sydney Sweeney, Olivia Jade Giannulli and Karina, but marketing experts say backlash can serve very different purposes depending on whether provocation was deliberate.
Sweeney's Novig campaign shows how controversy can drive a brand into the wider conversation, while Reformation's decision to put Giannulli in a "College" sweatshirt appears to knowingly play with her family's history.
Converse offers the counterexample: the company removed advertising featuring Karina after viewers drew disturbing associations from its imagery, saying it had "got this wrong."
Experts told Newsweek that controversy can strengthen a brand when audiences understand what it stands for, but attention alone does not guarantee loyalty.
When Backlash Becomes Part of the Campaign
Provocation in advertising is hardly new, but social platforms allow anger, criticism and debate to rapidly amplify a campaign.
That creates an uncomfortable question whenever an ad provokes outrage: did something go wrong, or is everyone talking about it precisely because the marketing worked?
Sweeney's latest partnership provides perhaps the clearest example of how the line can blur.
Her campaign for sports prediction platform Novig shows the actress posing with sports equipment while promoting its "just sports" message. It drew criticism from athletes including Olympic swimmer Ariarne Titmus, British sprinter Amy Hunt and former gymnast Gracie Kramer, who argued that it sexualized women in sports and undermined efforts to focus attention on athletic achievement.
...
Yet controversy clearly brought attention with it.
Novig co-founder Jacob Fortinsky told Front Office Sports that Sweeney, who has become an equity holder and strategic partner in the company, is "great at captivating audiences and being the center of attention."
"In some sense, it forces us into the national discourse," he said.
Michael Lewis, a professor of marketing at Emory University, previously told Newsweek that Sweeney's approach runs against dominant cultural narratives around how women are represented.
"She's a throwback to the 1990s and the old world of sex sells," Lewis said. "When she goes out there, the reaction is like a reflex."
The conversation has already spread beyond Novig. Earlier this month, Powerade released ads playing on "Just Sports" with their own tagline: "Never Just Sports."
Leah Macko, Powerade’s senior director of brand marketing, said in a statement to Inc. magazine: “When the conversation around how women are portrayed in sports started to pick up, we felt it was important for Powerade to share our perspective and reinforce what’s always been at the heart of our brand: athletes."
Newsweek reached out to Powerade's press team via email for comment on Wednesday.
Reformation Turns History Into the Joke
Reformation took a different route in its autumn "Good Sport" campaign with Olivia Jade Giannulli.
One image shows Giannulli wearing a sweatshirt emblazoned with the word "College," a pointed choice given her family's central role in the U.S. college admissions scandal. Her parents, Lori Loughlin and Mossimo Giannulli, were prosecuted after Giannulli and her sister were falsely presented as crew recruits in connection with their admission to the University of Southern California. That history gives an otherwise ordinary piece of collegiate clothing an obvious second meaning.
...
Reformation leaned further into the reference in its Instagram caption: "@oliviajade is back on campus in a crew that suits her better than the other kind."
The company said 100 percent of net proceeds from the limited-edition College Crew would go to YesScholars, a nonprofit expanding college access for students from underresourced communities.
Rather than avoiding an uncomfortable association, the creative appears designed to make audiences notice it.
Why Anger Can Have Value
That instinct fits the economics of modern attention, according to experts who spoke to Newsweek.
Americus Reed, professor of marketing at the University of Pennsylvania, said provocative celebrity partnerships can allow brands to communicate an identity to consumers, strengthening their connection with one group even while alienating another.
"The key distinction is intentionality," Reed said.
Sabrina Gottschalk, a marketing lecturer at Bayes Business School, said brands may also benefit from what she described as a "double attention effect" when they deliberately draw on a celebrity's existing notoriety.
"We live in a time when catching consumers' attention has become notoriously difficult, with information overload all around us," Gottschalk told Newsweek. "By leaning into a celebrity's existing controversy or notoriety, brands may be hoping for a double attention effect: the attention that the celebrity attracts, plus the additional attention created by the controversy surrounding them."
That may be particularly valuable for lesser-known products. Gottschalk said negative publicity can put an unfamiliar name on consumers' radars, with awareness potentially lingering even after people forget what originally caused the controversy. Established brands have less to gain from that dynamic because consumers already know who they are.
There is also a limit. Gottschalk said research suggests low-to-moderate controversy can encourage conversation, while highly offensive or deeply negative material may make people less willing to engage or share it.
Brooke Erin Duffy, professor of communication at Cornell University, drew a parallel with the rage-baiting familiar on social media.
"The same logic applies to provocative or polarizing ads: they get people talking about and, crucially, sharing the messages across platforms," she told Newsweek.
Social media magnifies both sides of that equation. Gottschalk said audiences can rapidly distribute advertisements through comments, memes and shares, but brands then lose some control over how their message is interpreted. The version that goes viral may not be the one advertisers intended.
When Controversy Becomes a Crisis
Not every backlash is evidence of a brand successfully pressing cultural buttons.
Converse recently removed campaign material featuring K-pop star Karina after social media users said elements of one image evoked Ku Klux Klan and lynching imagery. Rather than embracing the resulting attention, Converse apologized, saying it understood why the image was "deeply upsetting" and that it had "got this wrong."
Dr. Hyunsun Yoon, associate dean (Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion) at the School of Communication and Creativity, City St. George's in London, described the distinction as the difference between calculated provocation and a "brand blunder." Deliberate provocation anticipates criticism as part of the strategy, she said, while a blunder occurs when advertisers fail to recognize cultural meanings, historical associations or social sensitivities.
Gottschalk drew a similar line between planned provocation and crisis. A provocative campaign starts with an objective, such as generating conversation, whereas a crisis is unplanned and unpredictable. Crucially, however, the first can become the second.
"A deliberately provocative campaign can still develop into a crisis if the backlash goes beyond what the brand has anticipated," she said.
One warning sign is when consumers stop debating the advertisement and begin criticizing the company behind it. At that point, Gottschalk said, prolonged negativity can undermine trust, diminishing any benefit the advertiser gained from increased attention.
That is ultimately the gamble behind outrage marketing. Provocation can provide a shortcut to visibility, but consumers may also interpret a brand's willingness to provoke as a statement about its values. Getting people to look is one thing. Giving them a reason to keep choosing the brand after they look is another.
Newsweek’s reporters and editors used Martyn, our AI assistant, to produce this story. Learn more about Martyn here.
Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Emma Lee-Sang