The Super Bowl Social Media Challenge
Today I’ll be tweeting during the Super Bowl, commenting on the ads and the Kellogg Super Bowl Advertising Review. You can follow me: @timothycalkins
Many and perhaps all of the advertisers will be commenting on Twitter as well, hoping to engage people and get as much impact as possible from their Super Bowl investment. They also will be commenting on Facebook and other social media platforms.
These companies hope to recreate Oreo’s well placed tweet from 2013. When the lights went out, Oreo observed, “Power out? No problem. You can still dunk in the dark.” This comment was retweeted more than 10,000 times and is still regarded as a social media triumph.
Tweeting for a brand isn’t easy.
You have to recognize an opportunity, come up with something creative to say about it, check that the comment won’t offend anyone and then send it out. It is all too easy to say something inappropriate or something that will reflect poorly on the brand.
Social media creates difficult questions for brand managers.
Who writes the comments?
Who approves them?
Who monitors the reaction?
When you think about the profile of the Super Bowl and the chance that something could go wrong, this is a very high stakes situation.
I’m confident the advertisers we will see today on the Super Bowl have been working on this for months, many with the help of specialized agencies. Most brands will have created policies and roles and set up a war room. There are tweets already written and ready to go.
Watch what the brands do today on social media.
As you do, remember that behind each comment is someone at a computer putting their career on the line.
Someone from the legal team must be on call