Social Media: A Two-Way Street (Digital Friday/Promotion)

Hello, I’m Jim Glover, That Branding Guy, for Once a Day Marketing.  It’s Digital Friday and we are going to discuss and item I noticed in a blog by Lauren Friedman where she commented on five brands that embarrassed themselves through social media.

I don’t think anybody doubts that social media is a great way to communicate, share information and build relationships, however, social media is a two-way street.  When you share information your followers will share their thoughts in return.

Businesses may forget that and use social media as a one-way channel to push their content through to consumers.  When that occurs, it may be a source of issues.

In Lauren’s blog, she mentions companies such as McDonald’s, Toyota, Chapstick and Volkswagon embarrassing themselves in social media.  They had good intentions to create a positive exchange with their customers but in each one of those cases things went awry.

In some instances they received negative responses they didn’t know how to handle that.  In others the wrong impression was created in the marketplace.

Prior to launching any social media campaign, carefully consider the content and audience reaction.  Anticipate questions and comments and prepare a response plan in advance.

In the case of the companies noted above, as big as they are, their campaigns were failures.  It was a very public learning experience for all of them.  A small company such as yours also has to focus on the potential public response to your social media content.

Social media is a great tool for building communities and relationships as long as your message is well crafted and potential feedback, negative as well as positive is anticipated.

That concludes Digital Friday.  Join us next week for Smart Monday.  To discuss an online or face to face service engagement and enhance the marketing and branding for your organization, contact James Glover: (505) 501-1330 or onceadaymarketing@gmail.com.  I’m Jim Glover, That Branding Guy, for Once a Day Marketing and we’ll see you next time.