Social media can be great for business. It gets your message across quickly, cheaply and at an individual level. Unless, of course, it is an epic fail. Sometimes looking at these epic fails can teach us something. Sometimes it is just good for a laugh. A really big ROTFL!
Ready? In no particular order …
1. Just this week one of the large cereal companies posted on Facebook that if they received a certain number of likes that they would donate breakfast to a needy school district. Two problems here. 1. Don’t hinge feeding children on something as trivial as “likes”. Not good. 2. If you use GMOs in your product, be prepared to be called out on it. Result: Epic Fail
2. McDonald’s tweeted, “When u make something w/pride, people can taste it!” And then they added the hashtag #McDStories. I am sure they imagined people picking up that hashtag and shouting their love of McDonald’s across Twitterdom, but, unfortunately, that was not the case. Not. At. All. You see, people took that hashtag and shared every gross, unimaginable story they knew. Yea, not so good for business and a HUGE embarrassment for McD’s! Result: Epic Fail
3. Taco Bell thought they would be creative and tweeted this: “Have you ever dreamed about eating @TacoBell and then woke up and made that dream come true?” Sounds decent enough until you realize that it was written on Martin Luther King Jr. Day and they were playing on the “I Have a Dream” speech. Can you say tacky? Result: Epic Fail
4. Urban Outfitters offered free shipping to “celebrate” Hurricane Sandy …um, not a good decision on sooooo many levels. Result: Epic Fail
5. Last but not least, involves the Kardashian’s. I know …ugh! Here is the tweet:
Yup! They thought it would be funny to use the hashtag #Aurora to promote a dress as the details of the shooting of so many school children was unfolding. Result: Epic Fail.
Hopefully, those gave you a little laugh, if not at the subject matter then at the sheer IGNORANCE involved!
Have a great day!