November 28th, 2008
Social media marketing opportunism during tragedy = fail
I wrote just a few minutes ago about the communication issues that stem from social media in the time of crisis, i.e. the Mumbai attacks. In doing some additional reading after posting my article, I ran across something that I find not shocking, yet abhorrent — people spamming using the #mumbai hashtag to market their products or services. Here is the most prominent example:
Twitter user @seanzyville (who I hope is deleted soon) apparently created this profile only to promote a CRM demo from Web Solutions. The links he has posted as shown in the screenshot above go to:
I wasn’t the only one to find this behavior disgusting. I found the following tweet from Roberto Rocha, journalist for the Montreal Gazette:
I don’t think I need to say much more. If your company is considering trying to take advantage of the brewing conversations about Mumbai on social networks to squeeze in news about your company — don’t.
Jennifer Leggio, aka "Mediaphyter," writes about the "social business" side of social media - including enterprise, security and reputation issues. See her full profile and disclosure of her industry affiliations.
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