Ever watch a brand try to be “fresh” and feel your entire body physically recoil?

I think of Kanye West‘s 2024 Super Bowl ad promoting Yeezy. He shot it on his phone, in a vehicle. Unscripted and horrendous, in all-new ways.

I went and shared the link with several people, unintentionally helping Ye spread the word. And now I’m posting about it here. (Except intentionally NOT linking.)

This phenomenon — cringing at marketing fails but feeling compelled to share them — isn’t purely anecdotal.

It’s backed by great new research from marketing professors Brianna Escoe, Nathanael Martin, and Anthony Salerno.

Their findings reveal something huge for product marketers:

Cringe isn’t just run-of-the-mill embarrassment.

It’s a unique emotional response that occurs when we witness someone (or some brand) making a socially awkward attempt to impress — in a way we consider inexcusable.

The kicker?

Cringe makes us feel socially superior to the offending party.

When we share that cringeworthy Kanye ad, we’re subtly signaling to our friends that WE understand social norms better than he and his ridiculous mega-bucks corporation does.

In I Need That, I discuss how products succeed when they align with customers’ self-perception and identity. Cringe marketing does the opposite.

It creates an immediate identity mismatch that triggers rejection.

Remember Pepsi’s infamous “Live for Now” ad with Kendall Jenner? The one that trivialized social justice movements by suggesting a soft drink could resolve deep societal tensions?

That disaster generated 1.25 million mentions in a single day — a 21,000% increase in word-of-mouth.

Sadly for Pepsi, that attention was overwhelmingly negative, forcing them to pull the ad within 24 hours. 😬

The research identifies several common cringe triggers:

• Forced relatability (corporate brands using teen slang)
• Tone-deaf issue alignment (superficial social justice positioning)
• Awkward trendjacking (jumping on cultural moments without relevance)
• Failed humor (jokes that miss cultural context)

And then here’s the twist: some brands are intentionally embracing cringe — and WINNING.

Duolingo’s bizarre owl mascot Duo threatening users on TikTok or Wendy’s roasting competitors on Twitter represents controlled cringe. The key difference is that these brands are IN ON the joke.

The audience isn’t laughing at them; they’re laughing with them. (So, your mom was right!)

Product Payoff: Ryan Reynolds’ Aviation Gin masterfully capitalized on cringe when they quickly produced an ad featuring Monica Ruiz, the actress from Peloton’s widely-mocked 2019 holiday commercial. By acknowledging the collective cringe and offering a humorous “aftermath” to the Peloton wife’s story, Aviation Gin grabbed over 9 million views and an estimated $6 million in earned media value — all from a simple video shot in just 36 hours. They alchemized Peloton’s cringe moment into marketing gold.

Action for today: Do a “cringe audit” of your recent and upcoming marketing. Have a trusted outsider (not someone who helped create the content) review your materials and flag anything that might trigger secondhand embarrassment. Look for places where you’re trying to sound like your audience rather than your authentic brand voice. The greatest protection against accidental cringe is sincerity.

Seen some cringeworthy marketing lately?

Or watched a brand successfully harness deliberate cringe? Tap that reply arrow and share — I promise not to judge (you).

And do reach out anytime to my amazing team of product marketing experts at Graphos Product.