Culture and Brand Safety: A Conversation for Brands

Brand safety is a huge priority for advertisers, especially in the podcasting world. But strict guidelines and unrealistic expectations often prevent diverse perspectives, and leave audiences deprived of the rich, authentic content they seek. 

In SiriusXM Media’s panel session at ADCOLOR, Wait, Is My Culture Not “Brand Safe”?, panel members break their silence on the misperceptions surrounding BIPOC content and explore ways to balance brand safety with cultural authenticity. The panel featured: 

• Arnetta Whiteside, SVP, Multicultural Consulting Agency and Brand Readiness at Publicis Media's Cultural Quotient

• Jessica Diaz, Senior Director of Integrated Planning, Multicultural at OMD

• Nidia Serrano, Vice President, Sales Marketing, SiriusXM Media

• The hosts of Vibe Check: Saeed Jones, Sam Sanders, and Zach Stafford

Check out some insightful highlights from the conversation, and learn the different ways advertisers can show up for BIPOC creators and changemakers in the industry.

Defining Culture

Highlight: “I think culture is how we talk to ourselves, how we communicate with each other, and all of the different artifacts. The concerts, the clothes, the podcast, the expressions that we use to, again, communicate to ourselves and say, ‘I like how that sounded. I liked how that looked. I understand myself better or I understand you better.’ If you navigate corporate America, it's the moment where you have culture, but it might be reduced to two black women giving each other the look when someone in a meeting speaks over one of them or confuses them for one of the others.”  - Saeed Jones, Writer, Poet, and Co-host of Vibe Check

Culture Is Expansive, Not Limiting

Highlight: “When I think of culture and how I want to express my culture, our culture on a stage, in a podcast—I want to share my entire life knowing that it's not abnormal. It's not abnormal. My definition of culture is only expansive. It's not limiting. If someone says culture to me to mean ‘those folks over there,’ I'm going to push back against that. We all have culture. We all have accents. Live it.” - Sam Sanders, Reporter and Co-host of Vibe Check

Culture Belongs to the People

Highlight: “Culture belongs to the people. It doesn't belong to corporations. It doesn’t belong to the advertisers. You can be a part of it, but you cannot own it. Advertisers want to be a part of something, but they really don't want to be a part of something. They don't want to be a part of it until it becomes mainstream, because then it's out of (our) community, and into the other. For them, it has more weight in the other, than it does with us.” - Arnetta Whiteside

More Than A Checkbox

Highlight: “That is the problem with the world and the industry that we work in. Since the beginning, marketing has always been about finding the lowest common denominator. And so we automatically, all of our communities, get reduced to this one box, this one thing that they can identify us as, and that can be easily activated from beginning to end.” - Nidia Serrano 

Do the Hard Work

Highlight: “Everyone loves a nice, neat, clean box. You check it and you move on. But what's hard to do is the work. Do the work to go a little bit deeper, actually uncover the insights on our line of work. It's educating them, don't just do what's easy. You can do what's hard. It takes work. It takes process. It takes education from the top. But do it.” - Jessica Diaz

Keep Pushing

Highlight: “I have to remind myself, in doing all of this work, that feeling resistance to what I'm trying to do just means that I'm doing the right work. If I'm in these systems and not feeling pushed up against, and not feeling challenged, I've fallen in line. And so my reminder is me feeling uncomfortable. Pushing for these things is a sign to keep pushing.” - Sam Sanders, Reporter and Co-host of Vibe Check

Show Up for Everyone

Highlight: “LGBTQ people are 10% of the population. That means we are one in 10 of the people in this room, or one in 10 people that you walk past down the street, or one in 10 stories that you see in the news and the stories about taxes, hurricanes, just trying to survive. So, why can't you show up in those moments for us? And we found through the research that when you do show up for people in the places that they are living, there's a +70% rate in which they will buy your product, if you just show up for us.” - Zach Stafford, Journalist and Co-host of Vibe Check

Turn the Page

Highlight: “When we see brands expand past those moments of Pride, Black History Month, etc., there was a phrase I heard a long time ago that was ‘A stereotype is just a chapter in a book you haven't fully read.’ And these pride moments, these Black history moments are just chapters in the full stories of your lives, and we need them to turn the page, as Kamala Harris said. And y'all need to be part of that work as well. And that's how we get full humanity, is when they start seeing us as living and breathing 365 every single day.” - Zach Stafford, Journalist and Co-host of Vibe Check

Show Up Authentically

Highlight: “We're in a really vulnerable time. And I don't know about you, but this isn't the only vulnerable time I've had in my life. People who have shown up for me in an authentic way, when I felt like I was on fire. I will ride with them for the rest of my days. I think that's true for podcasts, and I also think it's true for brands.” - Saeed Jones, Writer, Poet, and Co-host of Vibe Check

Building Safe Communities

Highlight: “Do I feel safe? And is my work helping other people feel safe? I want people around me, and enjoying my work, to feel safe with me. It's less about brand safety. It's more about building a community that feels safe. And if those brands want to be a part of it, come on.” - Sam Sanders, Reporter and Co-host of Vibe Check

Brands showing up authentically for everyone means being in the room with all cultures and diversities. If you’re ready to chat about ways your brand can show up for others, let’s chat.