Metallica learn to love their web community

June 13th, 2008

 

It’s been one of the longest running sagas in digital communications. The story of a brand so unwilling to accept the thought of digital communications being at the heart of it’s future, that it has taken unusually harsh steps to avoid any sort of web involvement, especially in relation to its music.

The brand in question is Metallica - the world-famous metal band, and as i’m sure you know their hate-hate relationship with the web started in 2000 by taking legal action against Napster, accusing it of violating copyrights and instigating piracy, a course of action which other artists, namely Dr Dre, also pursued. 

However, where as other artists have not only embraced the web but flourished on it, Metallica’s uneasy relationship with the web has continued with a seemingly unending stream of ill-advised decisions when it comes to utilising, or in fact doing everything possible not to utilise, the web.

Fast forward to this week and Metallica were at it again, or so it seemed. The story goes that Metallica set up a listening party of their new album with music bloggers in London. Seems like a good idea to me..and a step in the right direction. But then, of course, the bloggers dared to post their opinions and reviews of the new album and consequently the Metallica web police took over.

Metallica’s management company requested that the reviews were taken down because the listening party heard an early mix of the album, which seems very strange considering they were invited to listen to it, and the vast majority of reviews were actually good!

This whole process seemed to be very much in keeping with the script, leaving bloggers and fans frustrated and spawning such headlines as: Metallica goes diva on the Internet…again, Internet ignorance leaves Metallica looking like cyber bullies… again, Metallica: A Tale of Lost Fans and those were the nice ones! UK music blog The Quietus takes up the story.

But then, in a move straight out of the social media crisis communications book, Metallica stopped what they were doing, and quickly communicated with their community via their website , saying it was all a mistake by their management team, they had been out of the country touring when it happened and immediately reinstated all the reviews, even posting them on Metallica’s site. Simple, honest, friendly and open!

Suddenly, we see Metallica in a whole new light, either they’ve finally taken some advice, or they are actually mellowing to the power of the web, which they should seeing working only too clearly with headlines such as: Metallica apologise for demanding bloggers remove reviews, Metallica “ear spanks” management, reinstates online reviews, Metallica allows fans to read about new album.

In one quick and simple move Metallica have gone a long way to rebuilding the bridges that they’ve burnt over the years, and although they need to work at it, the new site and new found attitude show they are on the right track.

Well done Metallica and a nice social media case study as well! 
Disclaimer time, we do work with Napster, and this piece is not supposed to be about Napster in anyway, the mention of Napster was merely relevant to the story. I should also mention that I was a fan of Metallica, and still enjoy the odd track…hopefully that covers everything! 

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Dunkin Donuts cave in to political blogger pressure

May 31st, 2008

At Liberate Media we like to offer examples of the power of social media and congratulate those that utilise the medium to drive change…usually for the better. Well, of course change for the better isn’t always the case and this post is an example of the use of blogging for what i personally believe is a ridiculous and quite dangerous cause.

Dunkin Donuts in the US has managed to cause a storm by bowing to blogger pressure to remove an ad, not because of environmental issues, or inaccuracy, but because of one item of clothing - an Arab keffiyeh scarf. And yes, you guessed it - it is because of potential terrorist affiliations.

Gordon McMillian over at Gordon’s Republic confirms that the reason Dunkin Donuts decided to pull the ad staring Rachel Ray a US TV chef and talk show host was due to mounting pressure from right-wing bloggers threatening to boycott the company with posts such as “Rachel Ray: Dunkin Donuts Jihad Tool”.

The company itself had this to say: Margie Myers, senior VP-communications for Dunkin’ Brands, commented: “In a recent online ad, Rachael Ray is wearing a black-and-white silk scarf with a paisley design. It was selected by the stylist for the advertising shoot. Absolutely no symbolism was intended. However, as of this past weekend, we are no longer using the online ad because the possibility of misperception detracted from its original intention to promote our iced coffee.”

It beggars belief that we’ve actually got to the stage where a simple item of clothing used in a completely irrelevant ad can cause this much uproar, resulting in a well known brand stepping down so easily.

As i said at the start of this post, this is a real and impressive case study of the power of social media, but in this instance it’s one that i won’t be proud to use. Furthermore, i fear it will be used by those that insist social media should be feared by brands rather than welcomed, but we take the rough with the smooth.

The BBC has the full story.

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Bloggers increase in number and influence

November 9th, 2007

Two interesting blogging-related surveys caught our attention at Liberate Media this week, firstly, Garlik - a company that advises people on how to protect personal information on the internet, announced that the UK has a blogging community of four million, or 15 per cent of the UK’s 26 million web population. And before you ask: ‘Yeah, but how many of those are active bloggers?’ According to the survey, almost one in five are blogging at least once a day.

The Guardian has the full story.

The second survey comes from the “2007 Arketi Web Watch Survey: Inside B-to-B Media Usage of Web 2.0″ by US marketing consultancy Arketi Group.

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