Big Social Media fails
Social media can provide you with wonderful platforms for brands to engage with their target audience. When brands use social media well, the results can be terrific. A brand can experience increased loyalty, advocacy and word-of-mouth, all of which can lead to increased sales. However, sometimes things go can go wrong and have a negative impact on a brand.
It’s good to learn from other people’s mistakes so we don’t end up making them ourselves!
Here are some of the social media marketing mishaps that are sure to teach you a few lessons.
1. EPICURIOUS
Epicurious is a popular food website. On the morning after the Boston bombing, they tweeted food suggestions to Bostonians. This was in very poor taste. The brand had to go into emergency damage control mode, issuing numerous apologies through social media.
A consumer brand must understand that when a traumatic event occurs, especially in their home country, the last thing the brand should do is attempt to tie the tragedy to their product in any sort of promotional way.
2. JP MORGAN
JP Morgan attempted a Twitter chat that blew up before it even started. The idea to host a Twitter chat followed the announcement that the bank had settled with the government to pay billions in fines related to Federal investigations.
When questions began pouring in, they began to understand the enormity of the hostile sentiment. The Twitter chat was cancelled and this did effect the brand’s image.
3. McDONALDS
In Jan 2012, McDonalds launched a Twitter campaign called #McDStories. The idea was to ask users to post nostalgic stories on Happy Meals. However, this campaign quickly took a whole different meaning, as users would use the hashtag to share horror experiences and shock tales. From poor work conditions to appalling food quality, McDonald’s campaign turned negative attention back to itself.
Whatever you put on the internet remains there forever and can haunt your brand forever. One mistake and all you can do is apologize, but you can never rectify it. See to it that your social media marketing strategy approaches online activity with a bulletproof plan of action or else it can devastatingly affect your brand’s reputation.