Social media is the fastest growing place on the internet, and this fact hasn’t escaped the corporate gaze. Savvy, quick acting corporate players are getting their marketing and communication operatives out there on the net and engaging in the real business of customer relations and brand-reputation management.
In New Zealand, few have been better or faster at the social media game than mobile operator Vodafone.
Vodafone New Zealand has a great advocate in its quick and clever external Communications Manager, Paul Brislen.
Having cottoned onto the power of internet communications and talking directly to customers, Twitter was was a natural area for Paul to expand into.
Twitter is where he works and plays, but not exclusively because he is technically savvy enough to hold his own in any forum. In twitter-space he scored brownie points for his handy customer assistance, transparency and deft approach, all while having a bit of a laugh, or so it seemed.
Vodafone via Paul won kudos from bloggers and key online influencers mainly because he hasn’t hoodwinked anyone and is genuinely helpful. In essence that’s what social media is about.
The internet and particularly its social networks are reliant on one essential thing in order to have any meaning whatsoever – trust. You can‘t see who people are so you have to take their word for it, or in Twitter’s case 140 characters.
Where Vodafone has come unstuck is in Paul giving up his @VodafoneNZ identity to a marketing operative called ‘The 3G Guy’, an import who was giving away clues for punters to win free netbooks.
This so annoyed the people who had built a relationship, that when his identity was assumed by someone seen as a spamming sales-pitcher, it royally peeved off some influential twitterer’s who promptly “un-followed” @vodafonenz and encouraged others to do so as well.
This afternoon Paul, to his credit, has said sorry, and chalked it up to learning new things in this very new space.
What did he learn then? Even if it’s true that on the internet where no one knows you are a dog, if you say you’re someone in particular, you’d better stick to that. People are very targeted and focused in the way they use the internet, and will shun you if this is not respected.
