Microsoft’s Social Media Marketing Fail

Some marketing campaigns are so groan-worthy you have to share (and turn them into an object lesson).

I received the following email from Microsoft, proclaiming, “You’re social, we’re social”:

Microsoft's Social Media Marketing Fail

Object Lesson #1: Don’t Beg

There are few things more pathetic than a brand begging you to be friends with them. I’m sorry, Microsoft, you can’t join my “cool kids” party. From the looks of things, if I “get social” with you, you’ll just beg me to buy a Surface next week.

Object Lesson #2: Avoid Marketing Jargon

Another big problem with this marketing communication is that it has so much jargon. I guarantee your customers don’t use phrases like “follow us on social” in their daily lives.

Object Lesson #3: Know Your Customer

Microsoft has no idea who I am or what I like, so they had to send me a generic, meaningless email full of marketing buzzwords. In our analytics-driven age, even an ordinary small business can know more about its customers than Microsoft apparently does about me.

Learn from these lessons, and you can at least prevent your customers from rolling their eyes at your marketing messages. To motivate your customers to do more exciting things, learn about the Communication Trifecta.

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