Skittles.com is doing a PR stunt – they’ve redirected their homepage to a twitter search on the word skittles. There’s no way to censor this – hence it’s marginally amusing to those inclined to say RUDE THINGS.
Here. Look – I managed to get some message about “anal cunt” to appear on their home page. Fantastic. I’m a big boy and my parents are proud of me.
What I didn’t expect is that my message would be retweeted several times by other peeps:
Thought I’d take a screengrab as I was pleased with myself – partly as I’m only dipping my toes in twitter and this is the first time I’ve ever felt a real inkling of its power.
Quite what Skittles make of it all is anyone’s guess – yes they’ve got their brand mentioned everywhere, but at what cost? Annoyed mums seeing rude messages? I’d pay a good 50p to sit on a few meetings and see how it’s going down internally.
This is, chortles aside, a really useful exercise. I work with brands who would all love to be in these kinds of spaces, ‘talking the language’ of social media blah blah blah – but as soon as you try to make it clear that it involves something less than total control, they back off. And with good reason. Unless you’re the kind of company that might appeal to your customers by allowing criticism, there’s just no way to get into the social space (for want of less nauseating phrase) without taking the risk that your name might appear next to the words ANAL CUNT IS GOOD.
I’d like to know what Skittles make of it too, although I can hazard a guess.
> I’d pay a good 50p to sit on a few meetings and see how it’s going down internally.
I imagine with lots of lube.
couldnt find a use for twitter now i have
If skittle keep it up and going, good luck to them. If the take down the link, they’ll look like bad sports, and foolish. but hey. look at what someone tweeted when i was there..http://mixthatdrink.com/skittles-vodka-tutorial/
I’m off out to buy skittles and vodka! Maybe the drink should be called ANAL CUNT in honour of this moment…
[...] on social networks is still in it’s infancy, with some notable successes and failures such as Skittles’ social networking homepage fiasco. These issues aren’t limited to business either, the third sector (charities, non-profits, [...]
[...] Recently, you may remember, Skittles gave over their entire homepage to people who tweeted the word “Skittles”, leading to much sweary fun. [...]