Enough to Make You Wet Yourself in Terror: Social Media Meltdowns

We're all business owners, managers, or employees, right?  Well, just between us, let's have a frank discussion about three little words that will make you wet yourself: SOCIAL MEDIA MELTDOWN

It happens.  to EVERYONE eventually.  Look at GoDaddy and their elephant butchering CEO, or Groupon's unapologetically condescending marketing team, or any of a dozen smaller companies on a daily basis.  Look at Borders, in fact, to see that they suffered a SOCIAL MEDIA MELTDOWN about a year prior to going out of business.  No one is immune.

--HOWEVER--

It's really, really easy to prevent a meltdown.  You can heal wounds and boost business back up to pre-meltdown or better numbers if you understand how it happens and what to do to prevent and repair it.

We'll use an Un-named Company (I don't want to bash the guilty) as an example.

Un-named Company posts a completely innocent status update on Facebook:  ‎"Like" this if you agree that starting the week with a clean house just feels so satisfying...

• This is how all meltdowns happen.  The company is doing it's thing and engaging customers.  It's a normal Monday morning.

Un-named Company receives a complaint comment in response to the update:  Just hired you guys.. A little disappointed that I got a phone call yesterday that the team would be here between 9:30-10:00 this morning and it is now 10:40 and no one has showed up..

• Un-named Company has just received a complaint and has an opportunity to repair things.  However, they do not respond to the customer with the complaint.

Un-named Company does not respond and over the rest of the day, 21 more complaints show up as comments on their entirely innocent post.

• This is where bad becomes a MELTDOWN.  A single complaint that went unanswered has snowballed into a huge social media issue.  

It has been 19 hours and the Un-named Company has chosen to respond with a classic delaying technique:  "Name of Original Complaining Customer, Please message us with your location and we will investigate this issue".  They do not apologize or address the other 20 complaints directly.  Clients are now rabid and encouraging each other to post bad reviews on OTHER social media sites.

• It's obvious that this company hasn't been monitoring their social media, they haven't engaged the customers, apologized, or offered any solutions.  They sound uncaring and negligent--which is what people in a social media world HATE.

Now, Un-Named Company receives an additional 16 complaints from clients, bringing their total to 36 complaints (all searchable online) in less than 24 hours.  What did they do next?  NOTHING...and the complaints are growing...

Steps to Prevent SOCIAL MEDIA MELTDOWNS:

1. Make Social Media Interactions into someone's job.
2. Respond to all comments left by all customers--whether the comment is positive or negative
3. Give an outcome to resolved issues and encourage clients to post the results, too.

Already Having a SOCIAL MEDIA MELTDOWN?

1. Apologize.  Sincerely.  Often.
2. Thank everyone for alerting you. 
3. Call each client FAST with an action plan.
4. Refund money, offer incentives, fix the problem AND tell everyone what you're doing
5. Over-communicate to the world
6. Ask clients to post updates on how the situation is being handled.