It would be nice to see them make a parody video of how they got it so wrong with an advice message to other companies but I can’t see it happening. Maybe we will make it on their behalf!

What should Nestle do now? I think two things:

NOW – Come clean. If they messed up and were sourcing unsustainable palm oil, say sorry, they didn’t realise and they will alter their purchasing in future. If they didn’t mess up and aren’t doing anything wrong, say so, but with a bit of humility.

FUTURE – Take social media seriously. Put a senior PR in charge of their communities, not someone who reacts personally to the inevitable baiting they will get from time to time.

If they don’t take care they will end up in Perrier/Benzine territory.
Thanks again for the original post.

Mike

This post was mentioned on Twitter by JaimeSteele: @scottgould http://bit.ly/btNW7K – cheers Scott – let me know if you want anything changed. J…

Thanks for the feedback and the discussion!

I’m curious to know, what do you think Nestle should do now?

Scott

Really insightful comments about a great original piece from Scott. Reading the silence/sincerity point from Deborah immediately brought the recent Tiger Woods debacle to mind and proved how even the biggest personal brand (and his advisors) can get things spectacularly wrong. First there was SILENCE. We didn’t hear or see from Woods for almost 3 months – a vacuum the world’s press rushed in to fill. Then when he did finally speak, it was so INSINCERE, stage-managed and painfully delivered it just made things worse.

Deborah is bang on when she says ‘You have to acknowledge that spin control isn’t possible anymore. You need to face your public with transparency and a willingness to engage in conversation.’ Remember when George Michael got arrested in the LA loos for soliciting an undercover cop? He went straight on to TV chat shows and held up his hands. He even turned the situation into a piss-take pop promo. We respected his honesty, his self-effacing humour and he retained a certain level of integrity. We forgave him.

Had Nestle said, ‘We would never source Palm Oil knowingly from unsustainable sources. We will launch and investigation and if we find otherwise, will rectify the situation with immediate effect and make reparations to the world’s sustainable Palm Oil forests’ they might have salvaged some respect. But they didn’t and I suppose with hindsight it’s easy for us to point out their mistakes

But there is a principle that all brands, Woods and Nestle among them, should have realised before their fall from grace: don’t stand for convenient and marketable values when the real truth is somewhat different. The public aren’t mugs.Treat them as such they will eventually crucify you for cheating your way into their hearts and wallets.

In this media context, the difference between organisations and the customer is degrees of constraint. The organisation must measure its response in conjunction with a well defined brand, values, history etc. and wider societal frameworks e.g. ethics, norms etc. As such, the organisation is more challenged on the internet than its free roaming, happily blogging and posting customers; it can be less attractive than an irate customer/community; and it responds much more slowly, because of the very dynamics that characterise organisational size.

And so the question arises: how can a lumbering corporate become an effective producer of viral media? Is it only about being more creative and innovative in the message and media? How can the corporate act like an individual whilst maintaining a consistency with its great legacy and image? How can the great mass that is “organisation” get one-to-one with the individual customer?

Perhaps our closest customer is also our nearest activist… Perhaps, in this internet context, we ought to nurture customers who nurture customers, nurture communities that nurture communities. Perhaps, we ought to begin thinking about our response in a very different way altogether.

That’s a good point re. silence v response – I see where you are coming from. Silence creates a void that inevitably will become filled with an increasingly negative vibe, on top of a virus of criticism.

I’d be interested in looking a bit more closely at Toyota…

Fancy a guest post?

You can’t control the message. You have to acknowledge that spin control isn’t possible anymore. You need to face your public with transparency and a willingness to engage in conversation.

However, contrary to what you say in the post, you can’t be silent and go viral at one time. Staying silent is never an option. what is critical is the perceived sincerity of your response.

Integrity and trust are fragile things. And reputation hinges on how you deal with this. Destroyed in an instant, trust takes a long time to rebuild.