The human side of social media shines through

FLAWSOME definition:
Consumers don’t expect brands to be flawless. In fact, consumers will embrace brands that are FLAWSOME*: brands that are still brilliant despite having flaws; even being flawed (and being open about it) can be awesome. Brands that show some empathy, generosity, humility, flexibility, maturity, humor, and (dare we say it) some character and humanity.

With the uptake of social media becoming so widespread and so accessible, it’s easy to see how hard it’s become to make talking to your audience through social media 100% failsafe. Unlike traditional media, where copy was proof-read, artwork signed off multiple times through an established procedure, the new media channels are directly in the hands of the marketers and their agencies, no longer going through a multi-level, compliance process.

Social media needs to be done ‘real time’, it needs to be quick, reactive and it needs to be accountable. You ask for feedback from customers and you need to be able to take the rough with the smooth. While many mistakes have been made in recent times (inadvertent or bad taste tweets for example) it’s interesting to see how adept many of the victims of poorly implemented campaigns have become – the art of spin has become the human face of many brands, as this report from trendwatch shows.

Source: www.trendwatching.com. One of the world’s leading trend firms, trendwatching.com sends out its free, monthly Trend Briefings to more than 160,000 subscribers worldwide.

Published
Categorized as Blog