LMU suspends ad on far-right website Breitbart

“Aware ads [are] on racist Breitbart?” said the tweet, accompanied with a screen capture of an LMU ad on Breitbart News Network, which prompted LMU to suspend the ad campaign.

The original tweet, posted by a woman only identified by her, a Sleeping Giants volunteer– who has no known connection to the University – continued “Will you block site from all ad buys & respond to students? Waiting for answers! [Sleeping Giants] @slpng_giants.” Within an hour, the official LMU twitter account responded, in a private message, that the advertising campaign was temporarily suspended.

John Kiralla, vice president of marketing and communication told the Loyolan via email that the ad is currently suspended on all sites, except Facebook, as the ad provider is being contacted. Pending a review of the websites that host LMU ads and overall marketing policies, updated policies will be shared with the community.

The way most companies advertise today, is not directly to each site, but by brokers or providers – such as Google, Facebook and AppNexus – that display ads on a range of sites all over the internet. AppNexus Inc., Alphabet Inc. (the parent company of Google) and Facebook are the biggest advertising services, according to Bloomberg Technology.

The Sleeping Giants Facebook page cites the automated ad buying system as the reason companies are unaware of the specific sites their ads appear on.

Associate marketing professor Julian St. Clair said this was an important lesson for any ad manager today, to consider the unintended impact of ad placement on their organization. St. Clair also supported the reviewing of policy and suspension of the ad on Breitbart. Breitbart is not compatible with “who we [LMU] are and who we want to be,” St. Clair said.

According to the Washington Post, it is not uncommon for companies to quickly react when made aware of advertisements on Breitbart. The mysterious organization Sleeping Giants, started last November, encourages volunteers to tweet at businesses and organization, with screen captures of ads on Breitbart, in hopes that they stop advertising on the site.

Sleeping Giants have said that they do not believe freedom of speech protects Breitbart to make money from advertisers whose policies and views do not match their own, according to the Guardian.

Breitbart, a self described alt-right commentary news site, led by former White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon has seen hundreds of advertisers blacklist the site since November, according to the Guardian.

Sleeping Giants lists over 2,900 companies, they claim to have persuaded that have stopped advertising on Breitbart, including Audi, BMW, Nestle and the Canadian Government. Companies including Lufthansa airlines have cited Breitbart’s political views as “radical,” according to the Independent, as the reason for pulling their advertisements.

Breitbart’s advertising revenue has fallen 51 percent since last November, when the Sleeping Giants campaign began, reported by the Guardian.

While political affiliation is a reason commonly cited by businesses that have pulled ads, the same is not true for LMU. Kiralla also told the Loyolan, political ideology does not influence LMU’s decision to advertise on the site. Rather, other factors such as number of impressions and target audience and desired association with other advertisers on the site, will be considered.

Students were divided when asked about the LMU ad on Breitbart. Most students, such as Kit Johnston, senior AIMS major, supported suspension of the ad and believed it was likely unintentional, on the part of LMU, to host an ad on Breitbart. While others did not see a problem with the original ad.

“I don’t mind because any publicity is good publicity,” Darvin Sumarkho, junior entrepreneurship major said.