In the Star Trek universe – there’s a training exercise designed to test how a Starfleet Cadet will react to a no-win scenario. The test involves a simulation where a civilian vessel called the Kobayashi Maru has been crippled. Life support is low – and all aboard will surely die if the Captain doesn’t rescue them quickly. The problem is that the ship has the unfortunate circumstance of being crippled on the wrong side of the Klingon neutral zone. That’s bad news. In short, it’s not a test that anyone can win.
Except James T. Kirk of course. In Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan – and subsequently revisited in the J.J. Abrams movie Star Trek – Kirk is the only cadet to ever beat the Koboyashi Maru test. How? He cheated.
Now, I won’t belabor how he actually cheats (you can read that here). But the interesting thing is Kirk’s philosophy for WHY he cheated. His response: “I don’t believe in the no-win scenario”.
I Was Really Beginning To Wonder….
So, earlier this year we all watched as Nestle suffered a major meltdown (forgive the pun) with its social web strategy when they didn’t react well to the Greenpeace campaign. I earnestly asked in that blog post: How do you argue with someone who doesn’t want to be right?
I wondered because then we watched Southwest Airlines duke it out with Kevin Smith – and by most accounts even when Southwest at least attempted to do the “right thing”, they still ended up a little bruised.
Then, last week two more…
And it gave us a great way to compare strategies.
First, there was the news that the CEO of Target had come under fire because it was learned he had donated $150,000 to the group MN Forward – which is running advertising for a Republican candidate who opposes same-sex marriage. As you might expect, Target’s Facebook page lit up with people calling for a boycott and calling Target out (oy, I’m sorry… forgive me again).
Anyway as I said then – Silence is not a strategy. Target didn’t seem to care (and still doesn’t) about what was going on within the confines of their Facebook page. The hate speak just got worse and worse and worse…
Then, boom, on Monday – word of another one. Jetblue has an employee go apeshit on a plane, grab a beer, deploy the escape chute and pull a “take this job and shove it” right onto the tarmac. By Wednesday night – he’s a folk hero.
And despite what you might have read on Ad Age, I personally watched Jetblue’s Facebook page light up over the next two days just filling with a range of comments. Some of them were screaming that he should keep his job. Others were saying that ALL Jetblue flight attendants were horrible. Suddenly almost everyone had something negative to say. And what did I see from Jetblue?
Silence.
I was disappointed. I honestly wondered if there was any solution to this. Is Social Media just a Kobayashi Maru? Are we, as marketers, just going to have to live with the fact that sometimes the conversation will escape our ability to lead it, and that our Social Media platforms will become a free-form hatefest?
Enter Captain Kirk…
So… the news articles that came out the days immediately following the Steve Slater incident pointed to Jet Blue’s silence.
- On August 10th Ad Age wondered if JetBlue was being muzzled by lawyers
- On August 12th – The Social Media Influence blog discussed why the silence was damaging and traditional PR crisis management wasn’t going to cut it.
But then, on the 11th, JetBlue posted a relatively tongue-in-cheek blog post entitled “Sometimes the Weird News Is About Us”. It was short, to the point – mentioned that there was an investigation and that they respected the privacy of the employee (the reasons they couldn’t/wouldn’t talk) and pointed to a funny clip from Office Space acknowledging that yeah, sometimes we want to bust up a few fax machines – but that there are 2,300 other employees who are still on the job.
And the sentiment seemed to turn a bit. 200+ comments on the blog post (to date). Jetblue very occasionally chimes in – but only (it seems) to correct a factual error. There are both negative and positive comments.
And the bloggers and press too seemed to notice.
- Peter Kafka over at AllthingsD blogged about JetBlue’s “comeback” to the Web
- MarketingVox blogged that JetBlue’s social media strategy seemed to survive
Then, I went and watched Jetblue’s Facebook page. On the 11th (same day) they posted the fact that they had released the blog post (200+ comments to that status update) and then – it just seemed to fizzle. Life went back to normal.
And, as of today, I’m looking at JetBlue’s Facebook page – and it’s chock full of stuff that’s NOT related to Steve Slater. Sure, there’s some negative stuff there – but there’s just as much regular ol’ “I love Jet Blue” and “Hey what about my discount you promised me” and just life as usual for the Social Media channel
Did They Cheat?
Not at all. Here’s what I think they did so well.
- They waited for enough time to pass. So, unlike previous mistakes we’ve seen made when the company jumps and reacts too fast before all the facts are known – they waited. Maybe this was the lawyers – but it took guts for that Social Media team to not say ANYTHING.
- They took just the right tone. They didn’t speak in lawyer-talk or get all “concern for security blah blah” and shift blame. And neither did they roll over on their back and throw all the employees under a bus. They balanced the popular sentiment that, yeah, sometimes work is tough – but we’ve got two thousand other employees who are awesome. Oh, and here’s a funny video.
- They moved the conversation. By posting it on the blog – and then posting the Facebook update with a link to the blog. Again, no special fanfare – just moving the conversation simply and elegantly with a status update. Basically “go here and vent if you want”.
Compare this to where Target sits today.
So, as of today (Sunday August 15th) they still haven’t acknowledged on their Facebook page anything at all. This is despite the fact that their CEO apologized and offered a statement on the matter. They seem to be ignoring it completely. And look what’s happened. The conversation on their Facebook page isn’t about the donation, or even the boycott anymore – it’s now (over the last three days) devolved into basically a Free Speech and Gays Vs. Straight Hate fest.
Now, you can argue that the amount of damage that a bunch of trolls on Target’s Facebook page is going to minimally affect their sales – but this isn’t the point. The point is if you’re simply going to ignore everything – then why even have a Facebook page to begin with?
Excuse Me, Your 15 Minutes Are Nearly Up
So, ironically, Steven Slater seems to have his own emerging Social Media challenge on his hands. After a few news outlets have started to report that he may have made up the whole story about a rogue passenger – the negative comments have started to appear on his own Facebook Page. Additionally, new Facebook Pages called Steve Slater is A Liar, and others (that I won’t mention) are popping up.
To me this only proves, again, why Jetblue was so wise to wait a little bit – -but not too long – before commenting – and not too much. These stories usually have some kind of twist – and certainly JetBlue is in a good place now to react to whichever way the story turns.
And that’s what having a successful outcome to a potential Social Media Koboyashi Maru is all about.
