When you think of Thanksgiving, you usually think turkey. And when you think turkey, you may think Butterball turkey. And when you have questions about your turkey, you may think Butterball's expert hotline. According to Butterball, about 100,000 phone calls will be made this year to their hotline to talk turkey.
But on my day of thanks, my thoughts turned to social media. Out of curiosity, I visited the Butterball web site. A wasted opportunity I concluded. Sure there was a hotline number and the web 1.0 ability to email an expert with questions. And yes, there were some helpful podcasts. But what they called a blog was more like a place to just send comments. While customers could send in recipes to be rated, there was no forum for users to share recipes and seek answers to vexing questions about stuffing, basting and carving.
And what about YouTube? If Butterball had posted any of their videos on YouTube, I couldn't find them. Type in Butterball on YouTube and you get clips from a Candid Camera knock-off where a blindfolded man or woman unknowingly compared the feel of turkey to a man's backside. Or worse I saw a disturbing video charging Butterball with mistreating turkeys. Not the kind of stuff that brands are made from.
Now maybe Butterball knows that their customers are not YouTube fanatics or big advocates of blogging. Or maybe they never considered the idea of maximizing social media's power. Surely though, they could benefit from a site where people can engage one another and possibly lessen the number of calls to their hotline.
If the latter is the case, a lump of coal for Butterball (and all the other companies out there who fail to take advantage of social media) on the day I headed back to New York City for the biggest shopping day of the year.
Let me get back you.
Tags: Butterball, turkey, Butterball expert hotline,
Technorati Tags: Butterball; Turkey; Butterball Expert Hotline;
Save to del.icio.us
Link to original post