There has been a number of high-profile mistakes made on social media recently, including gaffes from broadcast professionals and companies.
As such, let’s take a look at this week’s Twitter slip ups, so that anyone interested in conducting internet marketing can learn from others’ social misfortunes:
The Queen is dead…
Earlier in the week, a BBC journalist took to her Twitter news feed to state that Queen Elizabeth II had died. However, it turned out that she was reporting an overheard conversation between colleagues, which was actually referring to a scheduled obituary rehearsal. With the fake news not meant to leave the building, Ahmen Khawaja’s tweet quickly spread rumours that the monarch had passed away, which had to be refuted by Buckingham Palace.
The lesson here is that it is best to check you facts before weighing in on social media.
Jumping on the bandwagon
Following the breaking news of an ongoing incident at Alton Towers, a law firm was quick to take advantage of the trending hashtags to try and promote itself, but it did so in a way that has been deemed atrocious by Twitter users and the media.
Broad Yorkshire Law, a personal injury company, asked its followers if they had been injured in a rollercoaster crash, adding that it could help with compensation. However, with many people still trapped on the theme park’s Smiler ride at the time, and a number reportedly in a critical condition, the post was deemed as crass.
Pronoun confusion
After a former US athlete who has appeared on a popular reality TV show revealed her new identity as a woman to the public, many on social media made a few slip ups when it came to using the right pronoun. Caitlyn Jenner, who was formally known as Bruce Jenner, seemed to confuse a few twitterers, who still referred to her with male terms, such as ‘he’ and ‘him’.
With ‘misgendering’ an apparent problem for the transgender community, a Twitter bot, @she_not_he, was soon set up to politely correct posts that used the wrong pronoun for Jenner. However, this did not stop the Olympian from breaking a new Twitter record by hitting the million-follower mark only four hours after setting up her account.
- Instagram to expand advertising options - June 8, 2015
- A week of Twitter mishaps - June 5, 2015
- Twitter unleashes new analytics tool - June 4, 2015
