互联网是一个精彩的世界，但要想通过它获得真实意见，可要做好准备，因为互联网世界不见得全是鲜花和掌声。许多帖子、博客或者视频中充斥着未经审查的评论。很明显，互联网在给人们带来各种便利的同时，也为人们提供了发表批评意见的空间。不过，这些意见或许有建设意义，也可能并不尽然。

    麦当劳（McDonald's）早该明白这一点。1月24日，麦当劳在Twitter上发起了一项活动，但不久后就取消了活动，可谓马失前蹄。所以说，如果对互联网了解不足就贸然行事，并非明智之举。当然，麦当劳此次活动的出发点没有任何问题——发布几条付费“微博”，鼓励消费者与农产品供应商互动。起初，麦当劳发起了话题#meetthefarmers（结识农场主——译者注）。但在活动过程中，这家快餐业巨头又推出了话题#McDStories（麦当劳故事——译者注），希望吸引消费者发布他们在麦当劳餐厅中愉快的用餐体验。

    第一个活动内容是：“这些了不起的人在为我们生产土豆。”第二个则写道：“请告诉我们您对麦当劳的看法。”而在互联网世界，这样的提问方式绝对是冒险的举动。

    麦当劳随后发现了这一点，但却已经付出了代价。两条推广性质的微博得到了72,000条回复，麦当劳社交媒体部门负责人里克•韦恩发布发布微博称，仅有2%的回复为负面评论。但多数回复内容平淡、粗俗，甚至非常滑稽，这绝对不是麦当劳想要的结果。虽然负面评论的数量不多，但麦当劳的反应却堪称败笔，活动发起几个小时后就匆匆收场。麦当劳没有就本报道作出回应。

    罗切斯特广告公司Partners + Napier的CEO莎朗•纳皮尔认为，这自然算不上严重的公司危机。“这样的事情不会死人，也不会改变我们的环境。只不过，这次麦当劳在推广上确实犯下了一个愚蠢的错误。”她认为，公司一开始就不应该让这样的事情发生，并且，这样的错误并非完全无害。

    杜克大学（Duke University）市场营销与心理学教授加文•菲茨西蒙兹认为，负面的舆论可能伤害一个品牌，即便这些评论只是为了开玩笑，或者夸大其词。菲茨西蒙兹表示：“一旦产生了负面联想，就很难将它从人们的内心抹去。”

    所以，公司在遭遇社交媒体滑铁卢之前就要了解这一点，这才是明智之举。品牌资讯公司Prophet美国区总裁安德鲁•皮尔斯称：“几乎所有人都认为移动世界是培养品牌的完美媒介；但在面临负面舆论时，公司也不应该感到意外。”

    要想做好思想准备，接受负面舆论，需要公司对社交媒体有充分的认识——比如那些成功的社交媒体推广案例。2011年6月，宝洁公司（Procter & Gamble）发起了一次营销活动，由演员以赛亚•穆斯塔法通过YouTube在Twitter上发布简短而精炼的回复。宝洁公司称，共有2,000人参与了提问，作为回应，公司发布了约200段视频。根据公司最终公布的结果，此次广告活动大幅提高了宝洁男性护理品牌Old Spice的销量，并且在Facebook和Twitter上吸引了大批追随者。这次活动也向我们揭示了什么样的推广才会在Twitter上大放异彩：那就是随性且有趣的内容。

    The Internet may be a wonderful thing, but no one should expect sunshine and rainbows when asking for its honest opinion. Read an uncensored comment stream on pretty much any post, blog or video, and its clear that the Web provides people with, among other services, space to criticize, constructively or otherwise.

    So McDonald's (MCD) should have known better when it got knocked on its heels after launching a Twitter campaign on January 24. The idea wasn't a bad one -- pay for a couple of promoted tweets encouraging customers to get in touch with farmers. First, the company pushed the hashtag #meetthefarmers. But in the middle of the campaign, the fast-food goliath introduced the hashtag #McDStories, hoping to stir up good press about consumers' experience at its restaurants.

    The first hashtag was saying, "Here are the great people who make our potatoes." The second says, "Tell us what you think of us," which, in the Web world, is risky business.

    McDonald's found that out the hard way. The promoted tweets received 72,000 responses, McDonald's head of social media Rick Wion tweeted, and only 2% were negative. But many of the tweets were just plain mean, gross or, even worse for McDonald's, hilarious. There was enough of a negative response that McDonald's, which did not respond with a comment for this story, pulled the campaign a couple of hours post launch.

    Granted, this is not a major corporate crisis, says Sharon Napier, CEO of Rochester ad agency Partners + Napier. "It didn't kill people or change our environment. McDonald's just made a really silly promotional mistake." But the company should have never let this happen in the first place, she says, and mistakes such as these aren't harmless.

    Bad press can hurt a brand, even when comments are meant as a joke, and even if they are over-the-top, says Gavan Fitzsimons, a professor of marketing and psychology at Duke University. "Once you have a negative association, it's almost impossible to just remove the link from people's minds," Fitzsimons says.

    Companies would be wise to know that before they stumble into a social media fiasco. "As much as everyone believes that the mobile world is this wonderful petri dish, companies should never feel caught by surprise when news turns negative," says Andrew Pierce, U.S. President of brand consultancy firm Prophet.

    Staying prepared for negative press requires knowing the medium -- consider social media success stories. Procter & Gamble (PG) released a marketing campaign in June 2011 with actor Isaiah Mustafa dishing out pithy responses via YouTube to tweets. According to P&G, 2,000 people sent in questions and the company posted almost 200 videos in response. The advertising stunt boosted P&G's Old Spice sales and attracted tons of followers on Facebook and Twitter, P&G claims. The campaign tapped into something that generally gets great play on Twitter: irreverent, funny content.

    然而这次让麦当劳栽跟头的也正是这类打趣的Twitter内容。最好的例子来自@SkipSullivan。这位网友自称“在生活中是无所不能的多面手”，他发布了一则微博：“有一次，我刚走进麦当劳，就闻到空气中弥漫着2型糖尿病的味道，于是，我吐了。 #McDStories。”这听起来很恶心，而且也不可能发生，但人们就是觉得非常有趣。而麦当劳的财务表现一向出色，自然不希望人们看到公司的名字与糖尿病扯上任何关系。

    事实上，与麦当劳不同，Old Spice并非两极分化的品牌。这正是两家公司最关键的区别，纳皮尔认为，麦当劳早就应该知道这一点。诚然，虽然麦当劳正在尝试推出更健康的食物，但如果它试图利用互联网推动公司品牌与健康、天然食品之间的联系，肯定会有许多人对此公开表示质疑。纳皮尔称，这次社交媒体活动的发起过于仓促，在品牌转型过程中，任何一家公司都不应该对公众采取如此开放的态度。

    话虽如此，但麦当劳还是能够从中学到一些东西。对于空气传播糖尿病的微博，公司无能为力，但它可以针对关于公司门店、菜单或服务质量的投诉进行回复。纳皮尔认为，现在，麦当劳应该从这次失败的活动中收集数据，总结出消费者普遍提出的问题，予以改正。

    对于批评者来说，利用Twitter的确是一种不错的应对方式。例如本月，高中生维克多•冈萨雷斯在发给新英格兰爱国者队（New England Patriots）外接手查德•奥乔辛科的消息中抱怨称，两年来，自己一直热心地发布微博，但这位美国全国橄榄球联盟（NFL）球员却一直对这位狂热的球迷视而不见。对此，奥乔辛科在Twitter上进行了道歉，并邀请冈萨雷斯前往马萨诸塞州，观看爱国者队对阵野马队（Broncos）的季后赛比赛。这件事为奥乔辛科带来了不少的正面舆论，而代价只不过是一张机票而已。

    但对公司来说，也不能因为社交媒体活动的门槛低就掉以轻心。表面看来，进行社交媒体推广成本低廉，操作简单。但纳皮尔认为，要想取得良好效果，公司需要像其他市场营销活动一样，投入足够的时间和精力。“不可能贸然赶时髦，尤其是在社交媒体领域。”

    如果哪家公司想通过互联网征询网民的看法，最好还是做足心理准备，因为网民的评价有可能褒贬不一。通过更有创意的方式，征询网民对某个特定产品或服务的看法，也许更加有效。或者还可以采取更好的办法，那就是制作一些感人或有趣的内容，让网民们自由分享。

    译者：阿龙/汪皓

    That's the type of content that hijacked McDonald's campaign too. Case in point: @SkipSullivan, who describes himself as "pretty awesome at most things in life" on his Twitter profile, tweeted, "One time I walked into McDonalds and I could smell Type 2 diabetes floating in the air and I threw up. #McDStories." It's sick, it's impossible, but people thought it was funny. And McDonald's, which is performing well financially, doesn't want people to see its name and diabetes in the same sentence.

    A critical difference between the two companies' campaigns is that Old Spice isn't a polarizing brand, and McDonald's is. It should know this, says Napier. Sure, it's trying to introduce healthier food into its menus, but there's certainly a population of people who are going to balk, publicly, if McDonald's tries to push the connection between its brand and healthy, natural food. This social media campaign happened too soon, she says, and no company should open itself up this way when a branding shift is mid-stride.

    That being said, McDonald's could learn something. There isn't much it can do with the tweet about airborne diabetes, but McDonald's could respond to complaints about its stores, menu items, or the quality of service. Right now, they should be aggregating data from the failed campaign to see if there are any common concerns that the company can correct, Napier says.

    Twitter can actually be a great way to respond to detractors. For example, this month, high schooler Victor Gonzalez tweeted at New England Patriots wide receiver Chad Ochocinco, frustrated that the NFL player hadn't recognized his fandom despite his two years of avid tweeting. Ochocinco apologized on Twitter then flew Gonzalez to Massachusetts to see the Patriots play the Broncos in the playoffs. The story generated plenty of positive press for Ochocinco, all for the price of a plane ticket.

    But companies shouldn't be caught off guard by the low barrier to entry to a social media campaign, which can seem deceptively cheap and easy. For it to work, companies need to treat it with the same time and effort as other marketing efforts, Napier says. "You can't just jump on the latest trend, especially when you get into social media."

    Any company that tries to ask, "Hey Internet, what do you think about me?" should be prepared for a mixed response. It might be more effective to ask people, in a creative way, about a specific product or service. Or better yet, make something touching or hilarious, and invite the digital world to share it at will.