Comments on: Dear Nestlé: Social media is a double-edged sword

By: This week’s most clicked | SmartBlog On Social Media

This week’s most clicked | SmartBlog On Social Media — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 18:28:00 +0000

[...] Learning from Nestlé’s social disaster [...]

By: @Socks4HappyPPL

@Socks4HappyPPL — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 10:39:36 +0000

Wow… great post, and many important lessons to be learned!

Socks for Happy People had our own piece of social media responding to do today! A reader of our blog said that it all seemed 'a bit of a scam'.

Our response is here.

I'd be interested if you have any feedback as to how we can make our future responses even more effective!

Have a cool day,

Tom
My recent post Is Socks for Happy People a big scam?!

By: Mel

Mel — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 01:56:58 +0000

To me it seems that Nestle have learned nothing from the baby milk scandal of more than a few years ago. Every company has 'skeletons in the cupboard' they know they're there and they should have a strategic plan for managing them before and after they become public. Social media is a part and only a part of that strategic management

By: Carol

Carol — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 21:52:29 +0000

Inviting more online engagement with the public means inviting more scrutiny, too. I hope Nestle will review their sourcing after this - not just wait for the dust to settle and hope the activists scatter and jump on the next heinous thing: offshore drilling. My recent post Slice-n-dice the CEJA and Frack-n-soil the water. This doesn’t sound good at all.

By: mhandy1

mhandy1 — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 20:13:12 +0000

Ouch this is a major fail... sometimes its better to just let people say what they want and re approach with facts. Nestle should have just let the Greenpeace'ers look crazy they always do. The other thing they could have done was run a whole bunch of stories about how Nestle is helping people in Indonesia at the same time. Confront emotion with emotion in the correct way. Its bad story telling to be snarky in response! My recent post The Ten Commandments Of User Experience

By: @mstory123

@mstory123 — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 19:53:28 +0000

HChan,

If this does not wake them up fro the need to have an adult in charge,, I am not sure what will.

Mark
My recent post My Latest Gig: Contributing to Smart Blog Social Media

By: @mstory123

@mstory123 — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 19:52:35 +0000

@brandmonkey,

Thanks for your insight. It may not be fair, but corporate spokespeople have to hold themselves to a very high standard when interacting with stakeholders – and an enemy can be a stakeholder. Your story about the printers is interesting. I wonder, should you find yourself in the market for a printer, if you would exclude either of the two on the basis of not liking their online behavior?

And I agree that one person's boneheaded comments can paint the whole corporation in a bad light.

Thanks for reading.

Mark
My recent post My Latest Gig: Contributing to Smart Blog Social Media

By: @mstory123

@mstory123 — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 19:48:56 +0000

nickengelfried,

Thanks for reading and commenting. I hear what you are saying and thank you for your first-person insight on the issue. Avoiding the crisis is a tad more complex, I think. Multinational companies' supply chains are complex, and I think that they usually go with the most resonance cost – in fiscal capital and public relations chits.

I hear what you are saying about the rain forest, but are there potentially two sides to this debate?

Mark
My recent post My Latest Gig: Contributing to Smart Blog Social Media

By: @brandmonkey

@brandmonkey — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 14:24:58 +0000

This raises a critical question of just how much of the "corporate voice" should be handed over to individuals to manage. Companies don't want to be criticized for squelching their employees' personalities, yet when it involves a matter of dire PR importance such as this, corporate etiquette and citizenship guidelines should absolutely prevail.

I noticed a heated exchange on Twitter (albeit on a smaller scale), between two competitors–or rather, representatives from two firms within the same industry (printer manufacturers). Clearly both had been given free reign to speak on behalf of their organizations, yet the demeanor of one became utterly personal, almost petty. The comments quickly placed her brand in a negative light, when clearly she was just having a bad day. I doubt that a PR or communications team would have sanctioned such behavior had they had the chance to preview it or analyze the implications. I can see how irresponsible actions by a single employee who's taking on authority beyond her job title could get brands in serious trouble. I suppose that is the tradeoff of this newfound social media freedom.

@brandmonkey

By: Nestlé's Big Social Media Mistake

Nestlé's Big Social Media Mistake — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 14:10:14 +0000

[...] to blogger Mark Story, the comments from Nestlé included: “Oh, please, it’s like we’re censoring everything to [...]