Last week, Nestle learned something very valuable: social media is not a marketing tool.
Greenpeace protesters turned up on the company’s Facebook page with altered company logos for their profile pics and cried out against Nestle’s use of unsustainable palm oil supplied by Sinar Mas in Indonesia.
The trouble started when the person in charge of running the Nestle Facebook page warned people not to use altered logos of the company, and if they continued to do so, their comments would be deleted. Big, big mistake. Out poured more than 200 comments, most of which had nothing kind to say to the confectioner.
Some people say this is the dark side of using a Facebook page. I disagree. This was a case of mismanagement, a case of talking down to your customers – something a company should NEVER do, much less on its social networking page. If you think you just need to doff your hat at social media because everyone else’s doing it, or if you think it’s another marketing gimmick, you couldn’t be more wrong.
Say, Greenpeace members were using the altered logos in a protest outside the Nestle office in Vevey, Switzerland, would a Nestle executive have gone up to them and said, “Hey, we’ll listen to what you’re saying, but before that, hand me those posters. You can’t deface our logos at will (though we can do that with Indonesia’s rainforests)?”
So, how did Nestle think it could get away with cyber-bullying?
Also, a crucial thing about social media that Nestle totally missed is that if any marketing happens through social media, and it does, it’s incidental. What is important is for businesses to join in on the conversation, listen to what its customers are saying, and thus keep improving on their services or products from such feedback.
There can be no monologues now, no throwing of slick ads at the customer. The customer’s begin to talk, and how. So, like it or not, listening is part of the survival strategy now.
Huis clos sur le net: traditional media takes on the social
In February this year, five journalists locked themselves up in a cottage on the French countryside for five days. Their news needs were to be met only through social media sites – Twitter and Facebook. The purpose of the experiment, Huis clos sur le net, was to see whether one can rely entirely on social media to get genuine news. Though they could click on news links posted by users inside these social networks, the rules of the game prohibited them from directly accessing news sites.
The journalists’ overall conclusion was that sole reliance on social networks for news would not do. Rumours spread easily on Twitter and people’s identities couldn’t easily be verified. But they also found that the key to getting real news was the network you build. If you build a network of trusted contacts, you will most likely end up with the facts.
This experiment throws two questions at me:
Was social media ever meant to replace traditional media? Though it seems to have almost taken over the role of breaking news, social media cannot replace professional journalists, who are paid to ferret out news. The non-journalists among us don’t often have the time to go and physically do the reporting or check the source of news. This is not to say that only those labeled ‘journalist’ have the right to produce news, but producing news takes a little more time, resources, and commitment than passing on links does.
But let’s slightly change the rules of the game. Say, you have some important news to share, but don’t have access to a news room. In a world where these social sharing sites didn’t exist, can you imagine your predicament? In countries where freedom of speech is often reduced to freedom of whispering, social media sometimes is the only media of any credibility.
So, the answer to the experiment is a bit strange: yes, social media can be an alternative to traditional media. And, no, the former can’t replace the latter, when it comes to hard core news ferreting.
Weekly social media round-up
Twitter homepage, all spruced up
Does unravel the Twitter mystery somewhat to newbies. Link
You can’t ‘become a fan’ of anymore, but you can ‘like’ them Link
Is Facebook dirty?
Greenpeace says the data centers of cloud computing giants including Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Yahoo, and others are in large part powered by coal. See a reaction here that says cloud computing is actually more environmentally friendly than not.
Social media changing how the military operates
Never thought the two were compatible – social media and the military. But it seems they are, at least the unclassified types in the army. Link
Measuring success biggest challenge in social media marketing
Econsultancy surveyed 1,472 in-house marketers and agency executives this year, who said that measuring ROI from social media was very difficult. But I think this is another of those teething problems. (Anyway, there seems to be a site that’s already helping out with tracking social media campaigns.) Also, do we always have exact figures on the ROI from talking and listening to customers?
Facebook doesn’t spread STDs
A public health official in England thinks people are becoming more promiscuous, thanks to social network sites. This has to be the funniest thing I heard today. Link
Twitter’s heady rise has Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez in spin
Twitter’s latest storm is brewing in Venezuela, which has one of the highest rates per capita of Twitterers in Latin America. Link
Pharma cos find trial recruits faster on Twitter
Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Centre in Seattle is searching through Facebook postings to find 1350 HIV-negative gay men for a study of a potential AIDS vaccine. Link
