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July 01, 2009
WOM won't wait 'til Monday
Buzz isn't scheduled, especially bad buzz.
Thanks to Twitter, it can snowball into an avalanche of angry buzz after hours or during a weekend, just in time for the Monday morning news, as Amazon and Motrin recently learned. (Recent bad buzz for Domino's began on a Monday evening.)
The bigger the company, the more likely the inevitable unhappy Tweet that could begin Saturday morning. Then what? Who's monitoring your brand Friday night to Monday morning? Your social media manager? PR agency? Ad agency? Your social media intern?
Do you have a process to monitor and respond to weekend online word of mouth?
Let us know in the comments.
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Sorry, I don't think anyone should be "brand monitoring" 24/7. In relative terms, the hot spot of buzz is small percentage of people. Just because the mob is quick to pull out the pitch forks doesn't mean someone has to play the role of the witch to satiate them. Amazon did the right thing and I doubt they've permanently lost any appreciable amount of business.
Does 24 hours make a difference? Maybe in the world of twitter but does it in the minds of the customer? I think a well thought out rational response is better than a lightning quick response that may or may not be the right thing.
Personally I could see letting an intern watch the streams of data. Compile a summary and email to the head of Marketing. Only emergencies require immediate response.
Now using the streams to monitor ads and response to different marketing approaches is very different. If you launch a new program you should include it so that you can speed up feedback, interact with those creating buzz and generate more.
Don't try to control it but feed it when it is positive. Respond calmly to the negative but with a well thought out response.
I think it's almost impossible to monitor the blogosphere, Twitter, Face Book, etc 24-7, but it's good to pop in every once in a while over the weekend to see what is going on. I agree with Scott that it's worth waiting to respond to something negative when you've had time to really think about it, rather than coming home at 1am after a party and drafting a response.
On the other hand, if you need to keep something moving, (events happening via your brand over the weekend, or whatnot) it's great to pop in (or even schedule an important tweet) to share information.
My company recently helped pay for an upgraded phone, and now that I am one of the "cool kids" with an iPhone, I can be connected to our fans/followers/consumers all of the time, if I want to be.
Great topic!
Thanks for your comments so far.
Paul,Scott,
The problem with just assuming that it's a small percentage of people who might be talking is that it's not easy to tell how big that group might get. Also, at any time, the press could see the buzz and write a story about it, thereby amplifying the story.
April, the early responses to the online crowd can be as simple as "We hear you. We know of the problem but don't have an answer yet. Stay tuned." That is usually good enough for a first response. Of course, you do need to follow up then : )
Also, just let me state that I don't think every company in the world needs 24/7 monitoring. But the bigger the brand, the more that this is needed. Just ask Domino's : )
Sure Twitter and other social media networks may be a small percentage of overall opinion, but as any good WOM marketer understands, it only takes a few passionate people to sway the majority.
The landscape has changed. When sites like YouTube can rack up a million views in a matter of hours, monitoring is a must, even if it means getting a digest of mentions over the weekend.
The technology is still being perfected, but there are services out there that will automate sentiment for you and alert you when bad things are on the horizon. If that's not an option, why not outsource your weekend monitoring. If something evil is a brewing they can notify you before things get out of hand.
Hi! This is Carrie over at Brains on Fire. It is funny your brought up...Over past few days I have gotten to see just how fast things move within a brand community. I manage the Fiskateer community for Fiskars Brands from the agency side. We are exteremely lucky that We have 6000+ Fiskateers that do the "policing" or "brand Montioring". They care so deeply about the community and Fiskars that they are the ones that make sure thing are running smoothly. Below are some live examples of this.
http://www.fiskateers.com/community/topic/17525
http://www.fiskateers.com/community/topic/17634
My point is that if you have dedicated loyal fans that you love and treat as part of your company/brand, they will love you back, roll up their sleeves and get their hands dirty!
I'm agree with Jackie. We have to "learn" about social media habits. Due most of these site are personal, it's understandable that most people will start any forward action during their spare time, maybe saturday or sunday night. I also think it's difficult to keep a weekend tracking, but everyone of use have different ways to be updated. I don't mean to be on screen 48hrs on weekend, but we can check something for a couple of minutes at least at night.
I believe that the timeline for dealing with PR crises has changed. Bloggers and Twitterers measure response in minutes and hours, not days and weeks. If an issue arises over the weekend, it's not acceptable to remain silent until Wednesday (as Domino's did) while carefully crafting a corporate response. Consumers are powerful and informed, and they have come to expect immediate, personal, informative communication from their favorite brands.
If the intern is well-trained, sure, have her monitor mentions over the weekend. She can even respond, even if it's just to say "we're looking into it." And if the crisis requires more attention, that intern of course should consult with others in the organization to get information and respond quickly. And then, of course, feed the information to followers as soon as it becomes available.
As the landscape of the online world has continued to change the past few years, as has (should) business practices and how companies monitor their brand. Jumping on your respective tools (Twitter search, Radian6, etc.) during the weekends is necessary, whether big or small, because for consumers - they're not going to stop using your product or brand during the weekends and companies have to be prepared for the bad AND the good.
And as consumers are blogging and having a bigger voice online, where people are just tingling with anticipation to hear about the next fail-ure of a brand on Twitter, companies have to be able to respond quickly and swiftly.
This doesn't mean companies should be on 24/7 but spending a little time on the 'off' days monitoring your brand name is vital in this changing business world.
You have to monitor everyday, maybe not 24 hours/day, but at least once per day. Bad stuff just seems to erupt Friday after 5pm (my experience at Dell), so take a pulse check once on Saturday and once on Sunday - makes your Monday morning less chaotic.
I agree that the faster the response time, the less damage done, but it is something that needs to be thought out. Reacting for the sake of reacting doesn't equal much. If you don't have something to say, then why say anything at all. I do like the point that Carrie makes, if you have loyal customers out there they can squash the rumor before it picks up too much momentum. If you already have that in place then you don't need to worry about a weekend Twitter fiasco.
Great article. I don't think most business owners have figured out the power of word of mouth social media - YET! But they will. I can't wait for companies to wake up and realize that mediocrity is not acceptable. Companies need to learn to serve customers with the standards of Walt Disney World. This is in stark contrast to the experience I had a few days ago in a full service restaurant where employees were arguing over who got to take their break when instead of taking care of customers.
I've shared that experience at least five times in the last few days. Word of Mouth will straighten them up or put them out of business.
Jim Connolly | Organizational Results Experts | www.orgresults.net
I think it's important to respond as quickly as possible. The NY Public Library put up a new Web site on Monday - which didn't work. Hundreds of frustrated patrons called in,unable to reserve a book or access their accounts. It took over 24 hours for someone to put up a note on the site acknowledging the problem. And, it still isn't fixed.
Well, 24/7 is more than a schedule, its a integrated-brand promise. Should we be behind a computer all day? course not. But should we listen to all people whom take some of his precious time to tell us a story, complain or congrat?
I made a test last week, trying to post my comments to this issue in my native lenguaje:spanish.
As I figure out, it was deleted. We need not just being there, all time, where those whom speak our lenguaje are, but where ALL our audiences are. Markets define markets.
Why spend in a 24/7 business if we wont be connected with chinesse, latinamerian or australianh people?
Im an audience,
I think that the only time that you have to worry about this kind of response time will only be an issue if you have to deal with the negative. It used to be that you had 48 hours to respond to a customer. Now if they do not have an answer in an hour they are all over, complaining about your poor service.
