Disaster in a glass: When Coke lost its fizz

    There’s a famous line from the movie “The Matrix” when the evil Mr. Smith is holding the hero, Neo (Keanu Reeves) on a subway track as a train bears down on them. “Do you hear that?” he hisses. “That is the sound of inevitability.”

 

The social media “groundswell” described by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff in their bestseller, appropriately titled “Groundswell,” has been making that same onrushing train-in-a-tunnel sound for some time, and businesses large and small have found they either must snag a ride on it or they’ll either be left behind or smushed. The tracks are littered with the corpses of companies that waited too long to make their move (the honor roll of deceased newspapers alone would consume this entire blog).

The key line from the book is this: “Groundswell thinking is like any other complex skill—it takes knowledge, skill and eventually enlightenment to get there.”

Ah, enlightenment. Consider what access to the groundswell could have contributed to the awareness of the Coca-Cola Company. In 1985, in the pre-Internet days, Coke made the worst misstep in its history when the company ditched its original recipe and introduced New Coke. The reaction was so ferociously negative that after three months the company had to admit it screwed up and brought back the “old” Coke.

 

Coca-Cola had resorted to traditional marketing methods to convince itself that it could tinker with its iconic product and succeed: surveys and taste tests that drew generally positive results. But if Coke’s executives had access to social media, what would they have done differently? Some strategies they could have employed:

-          Created a Social Technographic Profile of its users to determine who would be participating across social media platforms and then introduce the “idea” of New Coke to key creators (Groundswell, P. 39), who would then blog, post and otherwise spread the word about the proposed product to Critics, Collectors, Joiners etc. who will either comment or at the very least follow the conversation.

 

-          Set up a private community (Groundswell, P. 82) where the company could engage its loyal customers, get their insights and even employ strategies that they might suggest. As Li and Bernoff note, if you don’t listen to the chatter in the groundswell, and respond to it, then you may never truly know what you’re company is doing wrong (or right for that matter).

-          Monitor your brand. My favorite story to date in “Groundswell” is that of the Mini-Cooper owners whose allegiance to their cars transcends measurable data. They don’t just love their vehicle for the gas mileage, but because owning one makes them feel special, part of a tightly connected community. Were the “Old Coke” faithful of 1985 any different? When Coca-Cola pulled their beloved soda, it was like they’d been betrayed. And don't think competitor Pepsi didn't take notice.

 

Your brand, Li and Bernoff insist, is what your customers say it is. Even a corporate behemoth like Coca-Cola doesn’t get to dictate those terms.