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Used car dealerships love to give away hot dogs. They think that giving away something small in order to bring in people to buy something big is a worthwhile concept. Why? Because the people who don’t make a purchase will think nicely of you while those hesitant to buy are more easily convinced (ostensibly) because you’ve given them something already. They “owe” you in the same irrational way a girl owes a guy sex after dinner and drinks.
It’s been 3 months since United Airlines was dragged into social media. There are hundreds of social media sites a big brand could use to connect with customers. Twitter, as the real-time queen of social media, is a good place to look for evidence of social media savvy and evolution.
Here’s a current snapshot of @UnitedAirlines:
“Twanksgiving Tware” says a lot about where United is with their understanding of how Twitter works. I feel for them like I feel for the baby boomer who uses ancient surfer lingo in attempts to connect with today’s youth. It’s awkward.
And what about the page design? If United Airlines offered deals on deep-sea expeditions through their Twitter page, the gradient would make sense. The logo hesitantly bobs above the heavily-cropped portion of an airplane. If you breathe deeply, you get a hint of mothballs as you
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Social media reminds me of those theories in which the universe is supposedly expanding until gravity eventually catches up with it, growth stalls, and then it collapses upon itself.
Part of the huge appeal of SM is the idea that we can continue adding new connections. Individuals love this as they meet intriguing people and get the game-mechanism reward of an upward clicking follower count. Marketers love it because we dream memes can go viral, exponential, universal across the new threads among human minds.
But that’s all BS, really.
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100’s of emails and thousands of DM’s?!? I have no interest in “Crushing It!” if it requires me to be stretched out like the skin lady from Dr. Who. I wouldn’t be able to afford attendants to
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Are you participating in social media with the same joy as when you first realized that people in Japan would comment on what type of breakfast cereal you prefer? From recent observations, my guess would be that you’ve lost your original spark.
I’ve noted the biggest changes in people who fall into three categories:
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Have you become a lazy writer?
You may want to reconsider the way you use contractions in your writing.
My reasoning is simple:
The “out of sight, out of mind” rule applies to words as much as it does to other things. As such, when you “hide” words by contracting them, you push a part of your writing out of sight. Banning contractions from your writing, if only for the sake of this simple exercise, will give you a fresh look at the way you put words into sentences.
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The reason for the photos of customers? (view them here) To quote the poster:
We get a lot of skanky hoe types around these parts; it is Miami.
The rest of the photo set isn’t much better. Beneath a photo of a badly-parked SUV:
I took this photo for all the people who think the stereotype of SUV-driving soccermoms who have no regard for their fellow human is a stereotype at all. Believe me, I work at Starbucks. I see them every day.
Classy move, Starbucks.
Starbucks has a bunch of Twitter followers but very little in the way of an aggressively vibrant social media presence. Searching major social media platforms and solving issues that tarnish your brand is one of the most important parts of a corporate social media effort.
Starbucks fails at this.
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