Nestle: Good Food. Good Life. Good luck.
March 2010

Nestle got hammered last week on the social media front.  It seems to have started with a note from the moderator of the Nestle Facebook page asking fans to stop modifying the Nestle logo, a bird in a nest. The modified logos were created as anti-Nestle statements in the wake of a rather graphic Greenpeace ad which made claims about the Company using palm oil suppliers who were destroying the habitat of Indonesian orangatuns.

Predicably, the request from Nestle to respect their visual identity spiralled into a bit of a tit-for-tat with ‘Fans’ pushing back and educating Nestle on what social media was all about only to have Nestle remind the world it was their page and their rules.

The entire topic has exploded and Nestle’s response to the issue has now become the stuff of both Globe and Mail headlines and anonymous tweets from New Zealand.  The result is a hit to Nestle’s reputation.  Nothing crippling to be sure but a waste of energy to manage and, more importantly, it didn’t have to happen.

What would we have recommended? 

First, Nestle’s stakeholder outreach effort should be much more far reaching than a Facebook page.  The war on bottled water and obesity means Nestle is under siege right now.  A quick glance at the Nestle Canada Web site shows the company really is concerned about health and wellness issues as the site is peppered with information on nutrition, balanced eating and the environment.  It’s a great start.  But the company really should be following the lead of other global brands and reaching out, in a meaningful, one-on-one basis with those who influence public perceptions about the company and its products.  Perhaps they are doing this already but I couldn’t find evidence of it. 

Doing so opens a channel of communication out of the public spotlight and, ideally leads to a situation where both parties can explain their positions – free of the media filter – and perhaps work collaboratively with a view to forwarding both the stakeholders’ cause and fulfilling a consumer demand.

Outside of that, there remains the issue of the use of social media.

Already well reported is the fact Nestle made a bunch of tactical mistakes regarding the tone of their posts (aggressive) and the trumpeting of their right to do what they wanted with the corporate Facebook page and make their own rules as they go.  There are better ways of dealing with this sort of a situation.  For example, Appleton Estates Facebook page forecast potential pitfalls to using social media and has a ‘responsibility’ tab on their page which clearly lists what sort of posts will be pulled, e.g. anything that appears to promote over-consumption of alchohol.  Nestle could learn from this.

That aside, the bigger issue is how their overall social media strategy is flawed.

We think it makes sense to own and frame the discussion yourself.  Seriously.  Why not, for example, actually post the offensive Greenpeace ad on a dedicated Nestle site?  That’s right, post the link right on your own site (Facebook isn’t designed for this sort of thing).  Post it and start a conversation about it.  Point out the falsehoods.  Wrap it in context.  Point to your CSR policies regarding only using suppliers that use sustainable practices (assuming this is true) and at the same time, post fact-based information from other leading environmental groups that refute the Greenpeace claims "assuming they exist".  (Shameless plug here: Communicor and Huxley Quayle von Bismark have actually built a digital platform called Digital Town Hall to do exactly this).

Yes, the strategy brings criticism close to home however in the world of social media, you gain control by giving it up.  

Look, when we Googled “Greenpeace ad about Nestle” not a single Nestle Web site came up in the first 50 returns.  What did come up were articles, blogs, tweets, etc.  All of the results we looked at were critical of Nestle.  If Nestle’s site came up on the first page of a Google search, more people would have clicked through and some of those would have also read about Nestle’s CSR practices or found information about what some other environmental groups think about the issue and in doing so, Nestle would have gained the trust of more people, would have become more credible in the eyes of many and likely would have created a lot more fans of the Company than they have of their Facebook page.

Prevailing wisdom is that social media is about having a conversation.  In that same spirit, we’re only too happy to have a conversation with Nestle or anyone else about our views on how to get the most out of this brave new world of social media.