Thursday 12 June 2014

#McDStories presents: When hashtags bite back

      I'm pretty sure McDonalds is the biggest food chain in the world. There are roughly 1 400 restaurants in Canada and more than 35 000 in the world. However, McDonalds also has extremely unhealthy foods that have made many people (especially in North America) obese. So when a hugely controversial company tries a marketing campaign like #McDStories, it doesn't surprise me that it ends up backfiring.

       #McDStories was supposed to be a place to share heart-warming stories about their products, sort of like the Tim-Hortons commercials, except on Twitter. But instead, people shared stories like "my daughter lacerated her throat with a piece of plastic in a burger. McD said 'tough'".



   

















     Originally, this seemed like a good idea, but clearly did not work for McDonalds. To me, it would have worked for a smaller business trying to get noticed. However, McDonalds already has a really bad reputation and their executives should have known that this was going to happen. It is too bad that they were out of touch with the public's opinion of their food when they launched the campaign, otherwise the #McDStories fiasco would never have happened.




#epic fail

2 comments:

  1. I find it funny but also disappointing that this hashtag is circulating and all too true, and yet people still flood in to buy the food. McDonald's is one of those rare things in life that people love to hate, AND hate to love.

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  2. It's not surprising that a hastag like this which was meant to do good backfired on the company. It's already known that Mcdonalds isn't liked by everyone and is questioned multiple times about its products which is why they started the "our food, your questions" page on their website to inform people of the "truth" behind their food. Sharing stories of a Mcdonalds story was bound to go wrong, another bad marketing choice by Mcdonalds.

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