The Quisenblog

As you may have heard, this past Monday morning, a group of hackers “hijacked” Burger King’s official Twitter account (@BurgerKing) and replaced all the BK branding elements with the golden arches of McDonald’s. The hackers then sent out posts on the hijacked account claiming that BK had been sold to McDonald’s, then posted some raunchy posts about customer and employee “reactions” to the fictitious sale. You can get the whole chapter-and-verse on the hack at Mashable.

It didn’t take long to figure this was a hoax, and within a few hours, Twitter suspended the account. And within a day or so, @BurgerKing was once again tweeting out content about Whoppers and Chicken Fries.

An interesting side note: blogger Travis Wright followed the hack in real time, and discovered that the number of Twitter users “following” @BurgerKing went from 77,000 at the start of the day to more than 111,000 within just 90 minutes. Suddenly, getting a Twitter account hijacked proved to be a great way to increase followers by almost 50%.

As you’d expect, over the next few days Twitter got a pretty good spanking from social media heavyweights. The micro-blogging service was berated for offering insufficient security to commercial and branded accounts. But to me, there’s a bigger story at play.

The fact that the hacked account drew more than 37,000 new followers in less than two hours reveals how most Twitterites use the service, and how brands just don’t understand it. People were way more interested in the real-time entertainment value of the hacked account than they ever would be about anything Burger King was tweeting out on behalf of themselves.

In other words, the big “fail” for the Burger King social media team wasn’t that their Twitter account got hacked. It’s that they came up way short in delivering engaging content their customers and fans really care about.

I did a double take when I read that BK started the week with 77,000 followers. That’s a pitifully small number for a visible national brand such as BK (Starbuck’s, by comparison, has around 3.5 million followers). The fact that BK been unsuccessful at getting even their most loyal customers to follow them is an indication of how lame their content has been.

In fairness to Burger King (and Twitter, for that matter), they’re not in this boat alone. The unfortunate truth is that many marketers, who are used to “controlling” their messages via mass media advertising, still see social as a way of pushing branding messages. They are unwilling (or unable) to give up control to an audience that might say…anything. They fail to grasp that social is an opportunity for deeper engagement with people who already ‘like’ them in real life. They neglect their responsibility to provide content that’s relevant, useful and yes, entertaining. Instead, boilerplate management-approved messages get sent out and are for the most part ignored by customers. And brands wonder why their engagement rate on Facebook is less than 0.5%.

I hope the Burger King hack teaches a lesson to brands’ social media teams, but not necessarily the lesson everyone’s talking about. It’s my hope that this serves as a wake-up call to create more compelling content, whatever the platform.

Posted by Mickey

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If you are interested in exploring guerilla marketing (or, if you prefer, non-traditional marketing) because you’re committed to creating something outrageous, standing out from the crowd, hitting people with an unexpected message when their guards are down and perhaps inciting a viral campaign, then it might just be for you. If you’re interested in guerilla because you want to save money or don’t have the budget for a mass media campaign, prepare to be disappointed.

“Guerilla marketing” is often defined as hitting consumers (prospects) with marketing messages either in places they don’t expect them, or in ways they don’t expect. While guerilla campaigns are rarely scalable, they can break through the mind-numbing clutter we each have to deal with each day, and can help consumers think about you and your offerings in a new, fresh way.

That is, if you do it right. And let me just say it here: guerilla marketing is not a cheaper way to do marketing. While it is true you won’t have the media expenses of a more traditional mass media campaign, you will have a lot of expenses mass media campaigns don’t incur. A lot of what we in the business refer to as “man hours”–fabrication costs, research and preparation, event planning and hosting, content creation, fulfillment and follow-up. All things you don’t have to worry about in the “set-and-forget” world of paid media advertising.

So how do you know if the non-traditional approach you’re considering will be a hit or an exercise in futility? As it turns out, many of the most successful guerilla marketing efforts have a lot in common. More specifically, they’re able to unequivocally answer “yes” to each of these questions:

• Is it surprising/quirky/unexpected? Unlike with mass media marketing, where you can buy attention, with non-traditional marketing, you have to earn it. Your content has to be disarming, and catch people with their guards down. These beer stein decals installed on glass doors are but one example.



• Does it amplify the brand’s story outside the traditional media space? Getting attention is great. But if it doesn’t play back to your core brand story (and what you want people to say about you), you’re likely wasting your time. This urinal poster for the Arizona Science Center is an example of linking non-traditional creative and media to boost the brand.



• Is it sustainable? Coming up with a “blockbuster” event might sound like a good idea, but too often these are little more than closed-ended tactics. This video for Coca Cola showcases one event (in this case, rewarding good samaritans who turned in an unattended wallet with tickets to a soccer match), but it leads to a bigger pay off for the brand–“Buy That Person A Coke.” Works for honest folks who turn in wallets. Works in hundreds of other situations too.
• Is it supported? Is it a stand-alone execution, or is it tied to other things the brand is doing, both on- and off-line? Social media provides your brand many possible ways to reach people. Plan ahead to determine how to amplify your guerilla tactics through social. Check out this video to see how The Opticians Council Of Canada amplified their guerilla tactics.
• Can it do things in a way that can’t be done in a traditional media space? Getting out of the two-dimensional world gives you lots of possibilities to explore. Check out this guerilla tactic for a gym.



• Is it disruptive, without being inconveniencing or annoying? People are used to advertising messages being restricted to specific times and spaces (magazine pages, TV programming breaks, etc.). Once you venture outside the expected ad media, you run the risk of irritating your audience and building resentment against you. If you’re going to intrude into their lives, you better make it worthwhile for them.

With the rise of social media, and your audience’s ability to share and spread things that interest them, guerilla marketing can serve to garner tons of attention to the brand, ignite word of mouth and generate ample free media, and get people talking about the brand. (Old Spice’s “Man Your Man Could Smell Like” and Burger King’s “Whopper Sacrifice“ are two of the most famous examples).

In the not-so-best cases, brands have wasted a ton of money, resources and good will developing stuff that their audiences, to put it bluntly, could care less about (Cisco’s “Ted From Accounting” web series comes to mind).

For 50 great examples of guerilla tactics that worked, click here.

The net of it then, is that in regard to guerilla tactics, while spending money is not a sure-fire recipe for success, not spending it is a sure-fire way to fail.

Posted by Mickey.

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Mickey Creative, Media, New Media, On Clients, Uncategorized, how-to, strategy burger king, guerilla advertising, guerilla marketing, non-traditional marketing, old spice, ted from accounting

In the 1993 movie Groundhog Day, Bill Murray portrays a TV weatherman who suffers the existential crisis of reliving (literally) the same day over and over and over again. There was nothing he could do to break the cycle, until he learned to relax, live in the moment, and be totally present to the moment in which he found himself.

Today, fast feeder Burger King seems to be going through it’s own version of Groundhog Day. Except for BK, here’s what their “day” looks like: franchises lose ground to industry leader McDonald’s; antsy franchisees march on corporate with pitchforks and torches, demanding a fresh direction; client blames ad agency for loss of market share and fires it; client then hires a new agency; proclaiming said agency exhibited “unique insights” into the business; after honeymoon period (that includes development of some head-turning work), once again sales begin to slide; antsy franchisees march on corporate with pitchforks and torches, etc., etc.

Rinse and repeat.

Burger King must have lived this “day” something like ten times over the past 20 years. And at the end of it all, it finds itself stuck in the same position, awaking to the proverbial clock radio blasting “I Got You Babe.”

This go round, the sacrificial agency was Crispin Porter & Bogusky, who in the half dozen years they had the account managed to do some fairly edgy stuff, including the Whopper Sacrifice, the Subservient Chicken and the memorable-though-somewhat-creepy bobble headed King. And now that Burger King has jettisoned CP&B in favor of McGarryBowen, we can expect Burger King’s fortunes to reverse themselves, right?

I can answer that in two words. Titanic. Deckchairs.

It’s a lot easier to blame an ad agency for your woes and send them packing than it is to look at your organization in a holistic way to determine the true issues. It’s a way to be seen as “doing something” that in the scheme of things may mean little more than put a band-aid on a tumor.

In a well-written article in FastCompany, Cliff Kuang points out what the real issues that have traditionally dogged Burger King are: the fact that, unlike McDonald’s, Burger King does not own the land its franchisees use, so it has little control over the stores, plus the fact that BK franchisees have historically been reluctant to embrace and promote a “value menu,” instead opting to push more expensive items during a time of economic downturn (remember “Meatnormous”?). As Kuang summed it up, “Advertising is a weak lever to effect change in a sprawling, franchised operation like Burger King.”

Yeah, but it’s awfully easy to fire your ad agency.

Whether McGarryBowen has the huevos to stand up and point out the 800 lbs. gorilla in the room is yet to be seen. History shows us that many times, as soon as an agency gets the scent of millions of media dollars wafting up its nostrils, it ceases to become the “truth teller” its client so badly needs and instead starts running out the clock.

If that’s the case, be warned, McGarryBowen: Sonny & Cher are waiting right around the corner.

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Social Media naysayers have been having a field day these past few weeks. Last month, after Beverage Digest reported that Pepsi’s flagship brand slipped into third place (behind Coca Cola’s Diet Coke brand) in the cola wars, a meme started making its rounds that money spent in Social Media was a waste, at least as far as major brands are concerned.

As proof, Social Media detractors point to two prominent marketers who cast their lot in Social Media and (apparently) came up losers—Pepsi and Burger King.

Some background: this past year, Pepsi opted not to advertise in the Super Bowl, instead embarking on the ambitious “Pepsi Refresh” project in Social Media. And Burger King, in lieu of matching McDonald’s dollar-for-dollar in paid media, instead leaned heavily on such noted Social Media campaigns as the Whopper Sacrifice and the Subservient Chicken.

And here we are, with Pepsi sales down 5% year/year, and the brand mired in third place. And Burger King having just experienced its sixth consecutive quarter of declining sales.

Some of the loudest voices in the room would have you believe it’s all Social Media’s fault.

If only things were that cause-and-effect.

The truth is, looking at the situations from the 10,000 foot level, just as you’d suspect, both marketers have challenges that go well beyond the decision of whether or not to tweet regularly or start a Facebook page. Both entered the recession #2 in a market with a strong dominant leader (in dicey economic times, market leaders can be expected to outperform the category to everyone else’s detriment). Both marketers suffered unsettling turnover in marketing and management. And most telling, both have made questionable marketing moves beyond the scope of Social Media. Pepsi, once the choice of the “new generation,” lost that mantle to emerging products such as Mountain Dew, Gatorade and the assorted energy drinks, then compounded matters by going through its much-lambasted multi-million dollar Peter Arnell logo redesign (exemplified by the much-mocked memo which infamously equated the new design with “the Earth’s magnetic fields and the sun’s radiation”). And Burger King? The marketer used nearly 60% of its ad budget in late 2010 in an ill-fated attempt to unseat McDonald’s dominance in the breakfast daypart. That fiasco made Gallipoli look like a stand-off.

And interestingly enough, at the current time, both marketers are operating without a Chief Marketing Officer. I’d wager that the lack of a strong visionary marketing leader has more to do with the brands’ struggles than decisions as to where it spends its marketing bucks.

Not to totally absolve Pepsi and Burger King’s Social media efforts of all blame. For starters, Social Media proponents were way too ebullient about the efforts, and heaped much praise on them before they ever generated an inkling of a result. And the strategies of both (if you can call them that) were questionable, in my opinion.

Regarding the Pepsi Refresh Project, the marketer seemed way more interested in the “crowdsourcing” part of the project than the actual good works being done. It seemed more like a marketing ploy than an authentic “cause marketing” campaign. Pepsi didn’t focus on a single unifying cause, like safe drinking water to the world or shoes for kids in developing nations. The emphasis on the crowdsourcing element proved controversial as well. There were well-publicized allegations of cheating. The projects touted by well-organized and well-connected non-profits benefited at the expense of average grass-roots consumers. Nowhere was this more evident that in the Gulf Refresh Project launched just after the BP oil spill. You can read about the issues we found with that project here.

And for Burger King? While its Social Media efforts were entertaining, product-focused and well-integrated into its media advertising, it all had a very tactical feel to it. Burger King has long lacked a cohesive strategic platform. What does the brand stand for? I’d bet if you asked 10 consumers, you might get 10 different answers.

Sorry, but “If only they’d have been in the Super Bowl” is not a grown-up response to the ails of Pepsi and Burger King. Marketers who think in terms of “either/or” when it comes to paid media versus Social Media are embarrassingly out of touch. Social Media, when used correctly and integrated into offline efforts, add depth to and amplify a winning strategy. (Great examples of this include the recent Evian “Rollerskaing Babies” and Old Spice “Man on a Horse” campaigns). Conversely, without a winning strategy, Social Media (as with any other media) are reduced to a series of “throw-it-against-the-wall” tactics. Just like an aimless logo redesign or a tagline-du-jour.

And speaking of Content Strategy (how’s that for a segue?), that will be what I’m covering in the upcoming intensive Social Media workshop through GSI’s BizStreet on April 28. If you’re interested, find out more and register here. Hope to see you there.

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Mickey Creative, Media, New Media, On Clients, Ramblings, Social Media, strategy burger king, Pepsi refresh, peter arnell, social media detractors, social media integration, whopper sacrifice