Even before the golden ticket and Charlie wrapping his hands around the iron gate of Wonka’s Chocolate Factory, we’ve wondered what it’s like inside the companies which make our favorite products. As a child (okay, maybe even as an adult), I dreamed about that magnificent candy heaven. Was Hershey’s just as neat? Did Cadbury have a chocolate stream too?
For all of us wishing we too had a golden ticket – wake up from the dream. We do. It’s called social media. Through corporate-sponsored online communities we can live inside the gates, if only for a moment. Company blogging invites us to get to know the faces behind our most-loved products. When corporate social networking and blogging are done effectively, it builds a brand loyalty that is difficult to break.
A few years ago I sent an email to a company complimenting them on their new detergent. (I just loved the smell, had to tell ’em.) Instead of getting a form email back from a customer service rep. I got an email from an R&Der. She told me she was glad I loved the scent and that was exactly the reaction they had been hoping for when they were working with the scientists to create it. I was hooked. Talking to someone who had created the product made me feel important and valued. If I feel that way guess which brand I’m reaching for next time I walk by that aisle? Yep, connections pay off.
Now if only oompah-loompahs were computer literate, that is definitely a corporate social networking opportunity.
