The Ocean State feels wrath of social media storm

 

A New Rhode Island Slogan Encounters Social Media’s Wrath

The state of Rhode Island recently rolled out a new logo and slogan aimed to invigorate tourism and attract business. In what was meant to be a landmark campaign backed by a $5 million budget, the state checked all the boxes by hiring a world-renowned designer, conducting market research, and enlisting a PR firm to coordinate the launch. The campaign officially launched on March 28, 2016. In less than one week the state’s chief marketing officer tendered her resignation and the first term governor had scrapped the slogan.

So what exactly went wrong? Pretty much everything.

The state launched the campaign with the slogan “Rhode Island: Cooler & Warmer” which was tied to new logo featuring a white sail set across a tri-colored square.  A promotional video and website were also released. Within hours a social media backlash began to form and grew louder by the day. Scenes within the  promotional video highlighting historic Rhode Island landscapes and activities turned out to be footage from Iceland. Pictures on the new website touting the culinary scene were actually from restaurants in Massachusetts. The slogan was roundly mocked on twitter and satirically photo shopped on Instagram. With each passing day additional social media influencers in the state jumped on the bandwagon bashing the campaign.While the state had hired Milton Glaser, a renowned graphic artist and creator of the iconic “I Love New York” logo, they were criticized for not also leveraging in-state talent from the Rhode Island School of Design.

Even though extensive market research and testing was done, there was nearly zero lead in and groundwork laid prior to the campaign launch. Many officials noted that the majority of residents were unaware of what the slogan stood for, leading many to draw assumptions – mostly humorous. Coupled with the numerous mistakes and lack of presentation, the entire campaign quickly became enshrouded in negativity fueled by social media.

In an effort to stem the damage and re-engage the public, the state has opened up a studio where residents are encouraged to tailor the logo and “make the slogan their own”; the best of which will most likely go to a vote.

FYI “Cooler” was meant to represent the creative and trendy offerings for people to discover and “Warmer” was to represent that residents were unpretentious and accessible.

Questions

While the state deserves blame for the mistakes, were they too quick too pull the plug based on the reaction from social media? Or was a quick hook the correct move?

What steps should have been taken through social media prior to the launch to not only engage the public, but also get a sense of what the reaction may look like?

So Long Social Media: Teenagers Opting for peer-to-peer closed apps

While Facebook remains the undisputed king of social networks with 1.6 billion Monthly Active Users (MAUs), recent studies have shown an increasing shift to messaging and auto-delete apps such as Kik, FB Messenger, WhatsApp, and Snapchat. A 2015 study by TIME had show that 11 million high school and college aged teens left Facebook between 2011 and 2014, a number that has since increased. While this may seem like a drop in the bucket compared to total MAUs, a study released this past August by Pew Research showed that 49% of smartphone owners between age 18-29 use a messaging app while 41% use a automatically delete app. These “narrowcast” apps were clearly preferred to traditional publicly accessible platforms such as Pinterest and LinkedIn.

While 70% surveyed did admit they use Facebook once a day and Pew did not break out age groups, the younger demographic answered they were logging in to simply see what others were posting as opposed to creating new content. With the surge in users aged 65+, Facebook has certainly lost some of its cool factor with the teenage demographic. Permanence and privacy are also commonly cited reasons for the shift as teens understand an embarrassing photo posted to a site such as Facebook is never truly deleted and potential employers now routinely search social media during their vetting process.

So is this shift a cause for concern? Well depends on who you ask. For corporations and advertisers who rely on FB “likes” to determine ad spending, less people sharing will ultimately disrupt the precise targeting which allows Facebook to generate the lion’s share of their revenue. Parents are concerned that they are increasingly becoming less able to monitor their children’s activities. Others argue that an increased use of narrowcast apps, limits peoples outside exposure to news and ideas that differ from their current beliefs leading to possible toxic situations. On the other hand advocates for increased privacy on the Internet laud these apps as a way to stop government and big data monitoring.

Questions

1. From a corporate standpoint, do you believe this trend is a real concern or simply a demographic shift that can be solved as apps like Snapchat monetize?
2. From a social aspect, do you believe there should be concern a younger generation could become potentially “closed off” from the different outlets by increased use of narrowcast apps?

Link:

http://newbostonpost.com/2016/02/17/so-long-social-media-the-kids-are-opting-out-of-the-online-public-square/