The news that McDonald’s effort to engage with Twitter followers has backfired is a reminder that brands have to be careful not to view social media as a traditional marketing tool, and adapt their social media strategy to suit the changing landscape of customer communication.

As part of a paid tweet campaign guaranteeing appearance in the day’s trending topics, McDonald’s issued statements under the hashtag #McDStories.  It took mere minutes for the message to be spectacularly derailed as the public barraged #McDStories with personal accounts of bad experiences, the most ghoulish being one customer’s assertion that they found a fingernail in a Big Mac.

Whether true or not, these messages have gained worldwide media attention and put McDonald’s on the back foot, necessitating a hasty U-turn and the removal of the hashtag from promoted tweet placings. 

This isn’t the first time a brand has seen its social media strategy go up in smoke by misjudging the Twitterverse’s enthusiasm for freedom of expression.  Only two months ago, Quantas came unstuck when it tried to placate angry customers with the hashtag #quantasluxury.  The stated aim was to calm things after its handling of a strike leftAustralia’s transport system in paralysis.  But Quantas misjudged the mood of the public, and #quantasluxury was quickly hijacked by customers wanting to vent their frustrations.

Successful hashtags are the product of a community, sharing an idea either because something’s in the news, or has struck a chord, or is a time-wasting bit of fun. It’s therefore not surprising that, since Twitter introduced advertising, there’s been a vocal backlash against the existence of sponsored tweets, in which brands pay to climb to the top of the trends without amassing the weight of tweet traffic that comprises a truly popular trend.  Part of the problem, as McDonald’s found, is that a promoted tweet is broadcast not only to followers, who would be more likely to be receptive to the campaign, but to the general public – including hardened and vehement opponents of the brand.

Even social media stunts that work leave themselves at risk. This week, it’s been revealed that the supposed ‘hacking’ of Katie Price’s Twitter feed was a publicity stunt organised by Snickers.  A series of tweets about distinctly non-Jordan subjects such as economics was only ended after Katie Price ate a Snickers. The brand position was that only by curbing hunger (with a Snickers) can you be yourself. The unfortunate subtext, picked up by many commentators, was that it also suggests either that eating a Snickers reduces the consumer’s intelligence.

The blunt fact is that social media is a whole new ball game for marketers – especially the instant, rapid-fire world of Twitter.  The wrong message will go viral in seconds, as Ed Miliband found to his cost when predictive text put a typo into his tweet about Bob Holness.  Considering that social media has been cited in the Arab Spring of national revolutions, it seems foolhardy for anybody to try and dictate the conversation.  If Twitter can topple a government, what hope for a brand?

Twitter’s audience is media-savvy and incredibly engaged.  The Twitter platform is designed to deliver a two-way dialogue, and the best brands on Twitter understand this, building a community through usefulness (whether that means informing followers of the latest developments in their field, or delivering good service to customers) or personality (via humour or a willingness to reply to and retweet followers’ messages).

Getting a social media strategy right takes time, patience and the willingness to embrace Twitter etiquette.  The crucial thing is to dispense with hard-sell marketing techniques in favour of a softer approach – in some ways social media isn’t marketing at all but public relations, in the purest sense of the term: direct, unmediated contact.

A brand with a divisive presence, like McDonalds, or one that requires a tactful in crisis management, such as Quantas, would be advised to steer clear of hashtags entirely.  As both have found, it’s the surest, fastest and most public way to finding out that not everybody wants to be sold to.