Most advertisings are meant to help create a brand, but sometimes it comes with a negative brand perception. A Mumbai-based edutech startup WhiteHat Jr has been facing flak on social for its advertisement across TV and digital platforms.
WhiteHat Jr, in early August, was acquired by BYJU for USD 300 million. The app helps children learn programming and encourages them to create games, animations, applications and more. Founded in 2018, WhiteHat Jr helps kids from age 6-18 years to build commercial-ready games, animations and apps online using the fundamentals of coding. It offers four levels of courses - beginner, intermediate, advanced and professional - for students in grades 1-12.
But, the company's advertisement seems to have gone wrong. One of their TV commercial shows a group of people, as investors, fighting with each other to invest in an app created by a young boy. While the neighbour expresses shock as to how such a young boy can develop an app, the WhiteHat Jr plug in flashes along. The company's advertisement stresses that every child in India can now learn coding by taking classes from home.
But, the advert didn’t go down well with a section of netizens who started trolling WhiteHat Jr for the same. Users have complained that the edtech company has been bombarding them with TV and digital ads. Some have taken to Twitter to address their grievances with the company.
One user said, "Whitehat Jr won’t stop showing you ads until you find a girlfriend, get married, produce kids and get them enrolled in Whitehat jr."
While another user said, "Can't wait to have kids...so that they can learn coding on the white hat jr. and I can get rid of the ads."
Here's what netizens had to say:
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