(Taken from Mashable article)
When Injecting Yourself Into A Conversation On Social Media Can Turn Into A Nightmare For Your Brand- Tacos, Taco Bell & Social Media Content
If you're a social media content creator or manager for a brand, it's so important that the content you create and the conversations you inject yourself into are relevant and a great representation for your brand. Simply getting your name out there because you were able to get people to talk back to you is not only irresponsible, but as Taco Bell showed with it's error, it's BAD BUSINESS.
For the whole article, you can find out what happened here on Mashable.
When you're on Twitter, Facebook or any other top social media platform, one way to build engagement, get people to find your brand and to get your name out there, is to inject yourself into conversations. For example, if you do nutritional coaching or consulting for people who want to change their diet, you might want to comment on content that Dr Oz or some other very large celebrity is sharing. But you want to remember some basic rules when doing so.
3 Keys To Effectively Injecting Yourself Into Big Conversations On Social Media
1. Context is everything. Make sure you know all the facts. This Taco Bell rep either didn't understand that every mention of the word 'taco' isn't relevant to their brand OR they were just plain stupid. I hope it's the first one. A lot of people use the Twitter search feature and the Facebook hashtag feature to find good conversations to become a part of. Be wise when you do this, and make sure you undersatnd the CONTEXT of the conversation.
2. Be helpful. Because I have a celebrity page on Facebook that is verified and has more than 1.1 million people on it, I see people trying to inject themselves into our conversations alot. People who leave their URL, try to lure our customers over to their page are obvious offenders. They look more like pimps than marketers. But if you're helpful and are really bringing value, that's a great way to earn not only our trust and respect, but that of our customers. Others we'll block, ban and report you to Facebook.
3. SEO is not always your friend. If you take the lame approach of just talking to anyone who is using the keyword you've put into your auto-search you could end up with a nightmare on your hands. You need to take the time to see what the conversation is about, the possible ramifications of injecting yourself, are you helpful (see #2), is the context relevant to your brand (see #1) and is this the right time and way to do this. Just having fun and being a part of a conversation without having your aim always going for the 'closing the sale' juggler will bring about greater long term results.
Taco Bell really blew it and it's dominating newsfeeds today. I wonder if the person who did that Tweet is even working their anymore. In our company if you're going to create any content for us or represent our brand at all, we're super strict about all of these points. The kind of people we look for are the ones who can carry on a conversation, be helpful, remember context and be relevant- to our brand and the situation.
Remember this the next time you you do 'news jacking' type marketing. You'll be glad you did!
Love,
Sandi
