Insensitivity to Tragedy
In July 2012, after mass movie-theatre shooting in Aurora, Colorado, Celeb Boutique jumped at the opportunity to promote one of its clothing items by the same name.
Lesson: Don’t use a national traged
Disgruntled Employee
Handing over the keys to your social-media platform means putting the integrity of the brand in that employee’s hands. When Chrysler tweeted the above, it was quickly deleted and the company claimed their account was hacke
Hashtag Attention-Grab
Although Entenmann’s claims it wasn’t aware that it was latching onto the Casey Anthony #notguilty hashtag, an astute Tweeter would have known what the entire continent was talking about in that moment.
Political Exploitation
In a blatant move of exploitation, Kenneth Cole nonchalantly joked that the riots occurring in Cairo were just people clamouring for the brand’s latest clothing line.
The lesson: Don’t try to capitaliz
Shameless Self-Promotion
Even good intentions can be sullied when brands put themselves first. What seemed like a sensitive tweet from K-Mart in support of the people affected by Newtown, Connecticut’s horrific school shooting was hashtagged w
Natural Disaster Tweet
These are just two of the notable Hurricane Sandy tweets that left a bad taste in tweeters’ mouths. Both President’s Choice and The Gap took the natural disaster as an opportunity to hawk their goods.
Inappropriate Joke
The Globe and Mail‘s “Caption Person,” who writes tongue-in-cheek commentary on weekly celebrity photos for the newspaper’s website, also has its own Twitter account. While this offensive tweet was quickly r
