When it comes to managing your brand on social media, it’s a lot of fun until someone calls out your brand with a complaint. In what has become a global audience, you might be faced with a sneer or a knock on your brand that feels a bit unfair.
While you should always address a social media complaint, there are times when you can do it with a little swagger and change the momentum around the post. Some brands are particularly good at clever responses and changing the tone of a conversation to come out looking smart. Here are a few of our favorite examples:
Don’t mess with the chihuahua. When Taco Bell got razzed by another brand, they talked smack right back, and showed off their sense of humor. The interaction went like this:
Old Spice: “Why is it that “fire sauce” isn’t made with any real fire? Seems like false advertising.
Taco Bell: @OldSpice is your deodorant made with really old spices?
JetBlue gets you safely on the trail. A JetBlue customer made a reference to the old computer game Oregon Trail, and JetBlue easily kept pace and looked like a good sport:
Customer: I just traveled all the way across the country without getting dysentery! Thanks JetBlue!
JetBlue: We have unlimited snacks on board, but when you shoot a buffalo you still only get to keep 200 pounds of meat.
Sainsbury’s gets punny. When a customer tweeted that they couldn’t find any cod in the store, Sainsbury’s jumped in with a pun-filled response. The customer volleyed back, and several exchanges included references like “floundering for an explanation,” and “there’s no point in doing it for the halibut.”
The next time you get an odd comment on your feed, try lobbing it back with a little humor. You don’t want to be flippant about a true complaint, but a funny post that demonstrates what a good sport your brand is will go a long way in boosting your image.
Want some help managing your social media? That’s why we’re here! Contact us at SJC Marketing for social media marketing that’s so fresh and savvy you’ll wish you could hire us for your personal accounts, too. (For the right price, we just might do it!)