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How Dove, Starbucks, and Oreo Failed (or Nailed) Social Media

Social media expert David Cuen looks at how big brands have marketed themselves on social media - for better, or for worse…
Marketing executive David Cuen (@davidcuen) knows how social media users tick. His expertise spans over twenty years, and has seen him in top marketing roles for the BBC, Instagram, and now for Booking.com. If there’s anyone who knows the secret to connecting brands with their audiences, it’s David.
In this video, David will take a look at how brands have marketed themselves through social media. You may think that big brands - with their big bucks - always get it right when it comes to social media campaigns, but even they can make mistakes…
1. #UnicornFrappuccino - Starbucks
The #UnicornFrappuccino campaign by coffee giant Starbucks was an instant success, and, according to David, clearly had some marketing masterminds behind it. Firstly, Starbucks made what David terms “an Instagram drink”. Pink, purple and sparkly, customers couldn’t resist getting a snap with the frappuccino in their hands.

This is what David calls “social currency”: every social media interaction a consumer has with a brand has a monetary value. And everyone wanted to get the Unicorn Frappuccino, not only because it looked like it contained magical properties (and perhaps more than a spoonful of sugar), but also because it was only available in a select few stores.
David says that some brands play on the concept of “scarcity”: by only making something available in a few places, brands can increase the desire for that product. By doing this, Starbucks created not just an Instagram drink, but a viral drink - because everyone who got their hands on one, just had to post a snap with the hashtag #UnicornFrappuccino.
2. #ShowUs - Dove
For David, Dove’s #ShowUs campaign from 2019 is another example of social media marketing done right. After a global Dove survey found that 70% of women didn’t feel represented by the images they saw everyday, Dove began putting out social media posts aimed at fostering body positivity. In one of their posts, Dove said: “You are speaking out against these outdated beauty ideals and we’re listening.”

Dove engaged with their audience, not only by listening to them, but by enabling people to take part and post their own photos using the #ShowUs hashtag. And still to this day, Dove are staying true to their word, by continuing to post photos that break with the stringent beauty standards of old.

3. The Best Men Can Be - Gillette
Even big brands can make mistakes, and according to David, Gillette is one of those brands.
In 2017 the #MeToo movement sparked a dramatic social and cultural shift. To show that they were what David terms “always on”, many brands created campaigns connected to the movement.

Gillette - a men’s shaving brand - responded to the movement by creating a campaign which said “We Believe in the Best Men Can Be”. It was displaying men - Gillette’s customers - behaving in the worst possible way, and subsequently changing to become “better” men. As David said, “It felt so disconnected from their brand… and basically portraying their core audience in the worst possible behaviour.”
It’s perhaps no surprise that the video didn’t go down particularly well with their audience, accumulating 1.6 million dislikes on Youtube.
Gillette had made a big mistake and thoroughly miscalculated their audience, because they had fallen prey to what David considers as one of the biggest dangers in social media marketing: trying to be “always on.” This is when brands try to jump in on every trend, challenge or social movement, without first assessing whether that trend or social movement is actually aligned to their brand values and mission statement.
4. Innocent
The healthy drink company from the UK has a distinctive voice, but for David, it lacks originality. “It’s the kind of content we’ve seen a gazillion times before,” he says about one of their social media posts, which you can see below.

David does appreciate that the content Innocent creates is aligned to their brand, but “it’s not as good as it should be,” he says. As a result, the engagement isn’t very high for such a well-known brand.
5. Dunking in the Dark - Oreo
Crowning David’s selection of social media marketing examples, is this viral Twitter post by Oreo. Oreo has proved that they are always on with this creative, funny, and simple post that was published at the exact moment everyone turned to Twitter.

During the popular American game, the Superbowl, the lights went out in the stadium. And a few minutes later, Oreo came up with this lightning-speed tweet: “Power out? No problem. You can still dunk in the dark.” Which was perfectly timed, because millions of people logged into Twitter to find out what was going on.
If you want to learn how to use your brand as a way to connect with your audience, you can profit from David Cuen’s 20+ years’ experience in his course Social Media Strategy: Connect With Your Followers.
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