Burson-Marsteller

Social media storm for Groupola

by Stephen Sandsmith on 13th July 2010 in The Cast Blog

The UK’s water suppliers may be suffering from a lack of summer storms, but there’s never any such lack on the internet, and a huge one has been brewing this past week as consumers react angrily to a PR stunt. At the eye of this particular social media storm is group-buying discount website Groupola, but what did they do to attract the connected masses ire?

The company recently announced a stunning offer – members could nab a SIM-free iPhone 4 first-come first-served for just £99, the very same handset that retailed for £499 as it sold out across the country within hours, if they logged on to the website at 9.30am. On the face of it, the almost-too-good-to-be-true offer from a reputable company is the perfect PR stunt. It’s guaranteed coverage in a week that has seen people queuing for hours outside retailers to get their hands on one, and after Apple announced a whopping 1.7 million of the handsets have been sold in the first three days alone.

The reality, however, is proving to be far different. Hundreds of tweets, Facebook comments and blogs have been written by disgruntled fans angry about the offer, and threatening to withdraw their business to the site. So where did it all go wrong?

Whether as a result of poor planning, unprecedented levels of demand, or a cynical marketing ploy, the company’s website was down for the majority of customers attempting to access it from 9am onwards. When patient customers eventually made it through to an order page, it only half-loaded, and displayed conflicting information on the number of phones available and already sold.

There is a long history of online retailers using viral PR stunts to drive customers to their sites and increase awareness of their brand (see Zappo’s recent “pricing error honoured” stunt for an example of how to do it right), but where Groupola appear to have failed so far is in their response to the unfolding crisis. Negative comments on the Groupola Facebook page appear to have been edited, whilst many consumers believe the numerous “real-life” accounts of iPhone winners on the site have been fabricated by employees, as some suspiciously disappeared after accusations were made.

At this crucial moment in any crisis, as irritation begins to spread, a sensitive social media response is essential to diffuse the situation and stop it becoming a PR disaster, and any perceived attempt at a cover-up will only infuriate consumers more. There is no such thing as anonymity on the Internet, as many brands caught attempting to edit Wikipedia to reflect their own PR messages or astroturfing online will testify.

According to a statement released by Groupola following the break of the story, they didn’t anticipate the level of demand their offer would place on the website’s servers, and they will continue to host the offer until all stocks have run out. Unfortunately, this statement has done little to appease the angry customers threatening to withdraw their business from the site, and the potential customers vowing to never use it.

Whether Groupola was a victim of its own PR success as the website failed, or a poorly-executed PR stunt, time will tell what damage (if any) is done to the brand. Indeed, some commentators are speculating that the vast amount of publicity this stunt has garnered, coupled with the hundreds of thousands of new email addresses harvested, will leave Groupola delighted with the results. We couldn’t possibly be so cynical…

This article was co-authored by Steve Sandsmith and Heleana Quartey from Burson-Marsteller London.

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3 Responses to “Social media storm for Groupola”

1. Elaine Cameron says:

   16th July 2010 at 9:22 am

   Nice one, guys. Would be great if there were a “Tweet this” button…
2. Website Administrator says:

   16th July 2010 at 9:23 am

   Thanks Elaine; we’re working on adding this as a new feature shortly.
3. Bill Royce says:

   16th July 2010 at 10:45 am

   Really interesting perspective, guys. It seems like the curse of the iPhone4 is not limited to Apple.