IT HAD all the makings of a social media disaster but Woolworths turned it around by remembering to listen to customers.
On Monday a post showing a photo of a Woolworths billboard near Ipswich in Queensland went viral on Facebook.
The billboard had the slogan “proudly supplying Ipswich with fresh food for over 43 years” and chose to illustrate it with an picture of a doughnut missing a bite.
Someone posted a photo on Facebook, pointing out that a doughnut wasn’t exactly “fresh food” and suggesting it was irresponsible marketing given the high levels of obesity in the town.
At that point things took on a life of their own. The photo was shared and reshared and dozens of posts popped up on Woolworths’ Facebook wall, basically saying the same thing: “Woolworths, what WERE you thinking?”
The photo also did the rounds on Twitter.
But late in the afternoon Woolworths moved into action, The Australian Financial Review reports.
It didn’t delete posts but it looks like it changed its settings so that the home page would display Woolworths’ own posts, leaving visitors to click on “recent posts by others” to see the criticisms.
The supermarket also started replying to all posts with the message: “Hi there, just letting you know that we are taking the billboard down today. Our intention was to show one of the products that we bake fresh everyday at our in store bakeries, but we appreciate that the image may have been confusing. We’re proud to be Australia’s fresh food people, offering our customers a wide range of fresh food choices. Thanks for bringing this one to our attention, we really appreciate your feedback.”
The creative director at advertising agency Frank Digital, Matt Barbelli, says Woolworths handled the situation well.
“The thing about social media is that you’ve got to use it as a tool not only to engage customers and post content but also as a tool to listen to what people are saying,” Barbelli says. “Woolworths has apologised and said they would remove the billboard.”
