A few days ago, my wife and I were eating hot dogs for lunch. There is something about eating a hot dog every now and then that feels great (even if you know what they are made of). While applying condiments, I realized that what should be an easy task ended up being extremely aggravating. Enter the relish “easy squeeze” bottle. Have you ever tried to use one of these things? A good squeeze yields only juice that infiltrates the bread, giving your bun a soggy, mushy pickled taste and texture. Give it a harder squeeze and a relish explosion ensues (I don’t recommend wearing a nice shirt for this experiment). I thought to myself, “Who invented the relish squeeze bottle?” After further consideration, I realized I wasn’t upset at the guy that invented the bottle. I’m a believer in trying anything once. The real question is why didn’t the key stakeholders figure out that the squeeze bottle doesn’t work and nix the project?
Sure, the relish squeeze bottle was invented for convenience. After all, no one wants to spend their day chasing little chopped up pieces of pickle around a jar with a knife. I’m sure the pickle companies of the world were hoping to capitalize on the success of the Heinz “EZ squirt” ketchup bottle that debuted a few years earlier. But, they forgot one important thing. Just because it works for one product or company doesn’t mean it will work for your product or company.
Social media can be the same way. Everyone is so eager to jump on the bandwagon and create a Facebook fan page or Twitter account. What they don’t realize is that without proper planning you are doomed to failure. What works for one company may not work for yours. You need to think about what you are trying to accomplish with your venture into social media. What are your goals? What sort of content will you share? How do you plan on engaging your customers? What will you do to attract fans to your page? How will you handle negative comments? It is very important to think about these things before you go public with your social media campaign.
Get your stakeholders involved and be prepared to spend some time planning before you send that first tweet or invite all those folks to your fan page. The old saying, “Poor planning leads to poor performance”, is definitely true when it comes to social media. Your plan should provide a steady, concerted effort to your campaign so you don’t have to try to overcompensate later. You don’t want your social media campaign to turn into a relish explosion!
