Jeff Woelker : Chicago SEO, SEM, and Social Media Consultant

Over the last several months, there have been several examples of how social media is still a space where many are still trying to learn and mistakes can happen, and often do. Whether it’s Motrin Mom’s, where being off message with certain audiences can lead to online outrage, or the recent Dominoes YouTube issue where a few bad apples threw an entire brand under the bus. In either case, there are several things that can be learned prior to starting a social media campaign. But just in case everything goes south, it’s still a good idea to have a contingency plan in place, just in case.

So you’ve kicked off some social media effort and all of a sudden you see 20 people, 60 people, 500 people on Twitter, Facebook, blogs calling your efforts lame, repulsive, inappropriate, and so on. Or even worse, a proprietary document that was never supposed to see the light of day is now floating around in the social media universe. What do you do?

Breathe deeply and think
The first lesson is not to fly off half cocked. Stop and pause for a minute and think.

• First define, who are “they”? Where are “they”? Twitter, Facebook, blogs, traditional media? Are they competitors? What does it say about “them” because of the spaces they frequent?
• How vocal are “they”? Put them somewhere on a scale with relevance. On a scale of 1 to 10 where 1 is “harmless razzing” and 10 is “foaming at the mouth”, where do they fall? Anything registering on this scale, is both important for marketing efforts going forward and anything over a 2 or a 3 probably needs further investigation.
• How much influence do “they” have? This is extremely difficult to define. With Google, Yahoo, Buzzmetrics, Radian6, and everyone else scraping the internet for content – if it’s online, it has influence. Anyone with “influence” can always find a no-name bit of information and report it as their own.
• Why are “they” so vocal? What is the context they are making these comments? Only by understanding their frustrations can you make an articulate response.
• Did “they” see the original version of the video, ad, comment, press release, internal document, etc.? Or did they see some subverted or doctored version meant to cause this kind of response?

Go to legal (only if absolutely necessary)
Although in the social media space, things move with lightning fast speed and legal teams are often known as slowing the process down, this is still probably a necessary evil. The more autonomy a brand manager or marketer can have in making these decisions, the better and faster a response can be put in place for the vocal “they”.

• What are “they” commenting on? Is it an internal document? Is it proprietary, restricted, copyrighted, etc.?
• If you are a publicly traded company, will it effect stock value? Will shareholders care?
• Do competitors stand to gain from action or inaction?
• Before issuing any legal notices, please use all other available vehicles. As most people in the social media space are individuals who are neither legally trained nor huge corporations, any legal action comes across as a David vs. Goliath scenario and this may only worsen the situation.

Prepare a statement
This needs to come across as sincere, honest, and actually acknowledges the problem.

• What was the real issue at hand?
• Why was each audience so vocal?
• Acknowledge “their” comments, sincerely. In the case of the recent AmazonFail uproar, Amazon first blamed the issue on a “glitch” and when it was later found out it was for another reason, they had to make another statement and in the end up released another statement that said the entire incident was “ham fisted“.
• What can you do to prevent this from occurring in the future?
• What can you do to win back those audiences?
• Does this effect any other marketing efforts? Do your agencies need to know?

Use the tools they use
When you respond, make sure to use the tools that “they” were using. In the case of the Dominoe’s issue, the President of Dominoes U.S.A responded via YouTube, much as the original issue arose as a result of YouTube. Likewise, much as you should be doing at the onset of such a campaign, engage with your audience where they are. By using the tools that “they” use, you can engage in a one-on-one or one-to-many setting, which will help to rebuild trust and credibility. It also acknowledges the fact that you are listening (in both the real sense, as well as the social media listening sense) to these audiences and care about their feedback. In the Motrin Mom’s case, they released the videos on Friday and by Monday, without a response, the issue has exploded across social networks.

Mea Culpa Debriefing
And lastly, once you have the firestorm somewhat under control, do a little soul searching.

• What can you learn from this?
• Did you gain new audience insights?
• Did you find new brand advocates or critics?
• Who came to the rescue and who kicked your brand while you were down?
• Do you have any brand loyalty based on your response? Was your response sufficient enough?
• Do you see long lasting negative effects as a result or have you saved the day entirely and turned a negative into a positive?

Have any other tips or things you’ve come across, which would benefit brand managers or marketers looking for the escape hatch? Let me know in the comments.

image courtesy of Marvin Kuo