5 Social Media Fails to Watch Out For

Mar 29, 2017

5 Social Media Fails to Watch Out ForA quick Google search for “funny social media fails” reveals the following:

  • 35 Worst Facebook Fails Ever by Bored Panda
  • 30 Of The Most Epic Social Media Fail EVER. by Distractify
  • 24 People Who Failed The Fuck Out Of Social Media in 2015 by Buzzfeed
  • The 18 Biggest Social Media Fails Of 2013 by Buzzfeed

As you can see, there’s no shortage of social media fails to laugh at. When that laughter is aimed at your company, however, well…it’s no laughing matter. The following is a list of 5 social media fails to watch out for. Keep away from these topics and you won’t find your company at the top of a Buzzfeed compilation.

5 Social Media Fails to Watch Out For

Being Insensitive 

You have your own feelings, opinions and ideas about a subject. That doesn’t mean that you, as your company should be sharing those ideas. Be sensitive to the various different life experiences, biases, opinions and assumptions of the many people in your audience.

Using Automation

Marketing automation is a beautiful thing. All those different “touches” to all those different people, all without the burnout of your marketing team! Marketing automation can go from very, very good to very, very bad very, very quickly. Keep some facet of your social media un-automated. Don’t discount the benefits of the manual, human element of social media – especially when handling customer service.

Being Too Creative

We’re a marketing agency, so we’re all about creativity. More precisely, though, we’re all about creativity at the right time and place. And, we’re about creativity after numerous amounts of internal testing. If you’re afraid a social media post might be a little risqué, ask around in the office. Get feedback first. When pursing new ideas and innovative content, proceed cautiously.

Dabbling in Politics

Political discussion are usually polarizing discussions. As your brand navigates the waters of social media, stay away from politics. Unless your brand is in politics, it’s really not appropriate to get involved. Remember how Kenneth Cole got involved in Egypt’s unrest in 2011? The tweet read “Millions are in uproar in #Cairo. Rumor is they heard our new spring collection is now available online at http://bit.ly/KCairo -KC” As you can imagine, the tweet came across as offensive and insensitive. According to our list here, that’s two social media fails at once. 

Being Ignorant

Many social media fails happen because companies aren’t in the know. They aren’t aware of what’s going on and make a poorly-timed faux pas. Make sure your company avoids such blunders by being informed of global happenings – even when it seems they don’t apply to your company.