When hashtags go wrong!

The #McFail

McDonalds recently launched their Twitter hashtag campaign ‘#Meetthefarmers’ in the hope to promote the company’s fresh produce and meat. The fast food chain took the campaign to a wider consumer market with the hashtag ‘#McDstories’. Unfortunately for Mcdonalds tweetsville soon hijacked their original tweet and re-branded ‘#McDstories’ with their less favourable experiences.

  

McDonalds hashtag is a brilliant example on the bad effect social media can have on a brand if they are not carefully planned. ‘#McDstories’ lost control within one hour, which suggests McDonalds did not consider that they are a company that strongly divides opinion and not everyone likes their food. It is not about their brand- but their consumers.


This is #Nuts!

The same can be said about the Mars owned chocolate bar Snickers, who yesterday sponsored the hashtag ‘#hungry’ for the reason they want to highlight ‘Your not you when your hungry’. But how well did this hashtag trend on Twitter?

When Snickers hijacked Katie Price’s Twitter account it had her 1.5 million followers wondering if she had been hacked! With recent issues in the NOTW (See here) about phone hacking this PR stunt could have gone terribly wrong. Luckily for Snickers they did not generate negative tweets about their brand. 

It just goes to show that when a brand sponsors a hashtag they cannot be controlled, and it can quickly turn into a PR disaster.

What are your thoughts on #hungry and #McDstories? PR fail or success?