“McFail” — lesson 1

I was reading about the recent “McFail” on Ragan’s PR Daily blog and it got me thinking about lessons learned. Convenient that we have to post about them…

My lesson? We can’t control everything  – especially when it comes to social media.

Now, my fellow #smrtcce folks will likely agree that we can do a lot of work up front to prepare and prevent. But there are cases, like the McDonald’s Twitter campaign gone awry, where even up-front planning can’t deter a social media runaway. There are a lot of ways to look at this recent “incident” but I’ve been thinking about it from that preparation perspective because of where we are in the course.

We (as PR and Marketing pros) can brainstorm, assess the risks, make a strategic plan and finally roll it out thoughtfully. And still something goes wrong. Even the smallest hiccup or misunderstanding can derail all that work. But that’s our job in a nutshell. Things come up. All the time. Forever.

There’s gotta be something we can do about it. And I think the answer is flexibility. We have to be ready to respond. We have to be prepared to manage the affected community. The plan doesn’t end at campaign roll-out.

So that’s my first lesson. I think Murphy had it right, but it doesn’t mean we have to accept it. So? We roll up our sleeves.