The exploding social media industry is changing the way businesses interact with their customers. Twitter, Facebook, and MySpace are drawing millions of people into active participation—and when you find millions of engaged people, you’ll find plenty of businesses trying to convince them to part with their money. For all the altruistic talk of companies connecting with human beings (that’s the social aspect), the endgame is always going to be revenue (that’s the marketing aspect).
Sometimes, however, the marketing and the social aspects end up colliding and failing. When this happens, we can all learn from and laugh at their mistakes. So, we compiled some of the biggest social media mistakes so you will know what not to do:
Many companies attempt to capitalize on a certain event that is in the news or that has gone viral on the Internet. Motrin thought it could capitalize on International Baby Wearing Week in 2008 with a YouTube video singing the praises of safe-for-nursing Motrin for alleviating the pains of toting a tiny tot. Many people saw it as “wearing your baby is bad for you, but Motrin is good for you.” The ad, which was trying to be funny, struck the wrong chord with some mothers, and their reaction was explosive. These mothers found the ad disrespectful and insulting. The ad may not have been awful, but if the core market feels that it’s wrong, something has to be wrong about it. Know your target market before designing a social media campaign.
Long before the “People of Wal-Mart” blog (which is real), the marketing brains at Wal-Mart thought their image would be better served with a fake blog called “Wal-Marting Across America.” The blog featured the journey of Laura and Jim, a couple making a trip from Las Vegas to Georgia and parking for free at different Wal-Mart stores during the trip. Every Wal-Mart worker Laura and Jim interviewed seemed to love working for the company. It was great publicity for Wal-Mart. But what was supposed to be a home-cooked, feel-good story of American folklore turned into some awful publicity for the company and the blog when it was revealed that Wal-Mart had hired the bloggers and paid for their journey. Blogs are only effective when they are true and relate to the reader.
Remember The Hub, the big social media forum for teens who really love hanging out at Wal-Mart? Wait, you don’t remember? Maybe that’s because Wal-Mart’s attempt at becoming the next MySpace lasted only 10 weeks. Wal-Mart tried to reach the youth of America by duplicating something that’s already relatively successful. Trying to convince youth to have a dialogue about how much they love Wal-Mart must be one of the most unlikely scenarios ever dreamed up by corporate America.