I’m not saying that Twitter celebs are fake, empty vessels who sociopathically toy with everyone in order to raise their profiles, but there are a number of people who sometimes – actually, no, scrap the but; that’s exactly what I’m saying.
Social media has produced a whole new generation of commentators who would otherwise have found it much harder to break into the media ranks of national publications, and though they may strenuously deny it – some may even really believe that their views are just so irresistible that it all happened naturally – the truth is that these people are often very savvy and tactical with their social media use. They understand current media trends and learn how to hop aboard bandwagons and send their profiles rocketing.
I can say this with some confidence because I do it, too. When I was studying journalism it was encouraged. We were told to establish a niche, to use social media as a ladder climber. I viewed it strategically. I’ve built a brand, and then rebranded entirely or made a few tweaks here or there to stay relevant.
It all sounds a bit cold and exploitative, doesn’t it? Well, it is, and it’s exactly the same as the master manipulator that is the marketing industry. Last week on Twitter, the two collided and sent irony off to a comfy couch with a bucket of popcorn to watch the fall out.
International Women’s Day (IWD) this year reached fever pitch. In the aftermath of a multitude of sexual assault and harassment scandals throughout 2017, which culminated in the #MeToo movement, IWD 2018 was a marketeer’s dream. Everyone wanted in on the action.
One company always keen for publicity is Scottish beer company Brewdog, which renamed one of its drinks from Punk IPA to Pink IPA for IWD, accompanied by some wonderfully stereotypical glittery branding. Predictably, the internet lost the plot over it.
Now, here’s the thing. The Brewdog marketing stunt was actually the creation of senior female executives at the company, who wanted to focus their IWD contribution on the gender pay gap issue (the rebranded beer was sold to women for a lower price). It was supposed to be satirical. It was about women owning the stereotypes often levelled at them. It was about laughing at stereotypes - which is an incredibly powerful thing.
But did social media care? Of course not. When it quickly turned into a Twitter storm, it was hours before I even realised it was a satirical marketing campaign. Judging by the flood of outrage, I really believed that a bunch of guys at a beer company had indulged their inner idiot and thought this was a serious attempt at a gesture to support women.
To be honest, I doubt whether many of those who jumped on the outrage train knew otherwise either. Why? Because that was never the point.
When self-styled social media ‘voices’ spot these swells of activity, the next thought isn’t about spending a few hours getting to the bottom of it, it’s about rapidly identifying how they can turn a marketing-stunt-gone-wrong for one company into a marketing-stunt-gone-right for them.
Twitter isn’t just a social media platform, it’s a giant marketing network. I hate that reality as much as the next person – marketing is not an exercise that brings out the best in any of us – but I can at least respect people who admit they’re playing a game on social media, and it’s as much about their own opportunities as it is about the causes they care about.
This isn’t a criticism. It’s logical that in order to raise awareness of what you passionately believe is important, you have to play a game that has a mountain of competition for attention in an oversaturated online media world.
And it’s only when people admit to themselves that they’re part of the game that they can get really serious about playing – and winning – for admirable reasons.
Social media’s feminist voices ripping Brewdog apart for its alleged sexism is not clever game-playing, and worse still, it betrays the notion of the feminist sisterhood - the original cause becomes second fiddle to the profile building, and for the out and out narcissists, the original cause was never their true concern in the first place.
The Brewdog storm offered a pointed insight into the social media marketing swamp, presented beautifully in International Women’s Day wrapping paper. But shamefully, when two marketing worlds collided, the women who were behind the Brewdog campaign slid into oblivion and nobody knew their names.
Solidarity, sisters, solidarity.
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