Tag: Oprah

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Fortune 500 Twitter News Twitterholics

Microsoft’s Bill Gates Has Joined The Twitter Universe

Mr. Bill Gates @billgates is in the Twitter Building!!!  Social Media Guide @Mashable has reported that Twitter’s Caroline Mizumoto tweeted about Mr. Gates finally actively tweeting online. Word spread fast and Mr. Gates reached 100k followers in @oprah like speed. Ashton Kutcher (@aplusk) is still at the top of the list at just over 4.3 million followers but Britney Spears (@britneyspears) is not that far behind him at 4.2+ followers. At the current pace of about 10k+ followers per hour Mr. Gates should reach the 1 million dollar club in a few days.  At this rate Mr. Gates will have more followers than his own @Microsoft_Xbox, @Microsoft, @Office_Live, @MicrosoftPress, @MSFTResearch, @Office and @SharePoint combined by lunch time on Wednesday, Jan 2oth.

So if you get the chance say hello to Mr. Gates. Who knows he might just follow you and donate millions of dollars to your cause…. NOT..;-) Welcome to the Twitterverse Mr. Gates. I look forward to following your updates.

All the best

JB

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Case Studies Twarketing Twitter News Twitterholics

KFC And Oprah Make A Mess Out Of Free Grilled Chicken

gc_kfcIf you don’t know by now the KFC (@kfc_colonel) Free Chicken Meal offer from Oprah (@oprah) is now over.  KFC pulled the offer and is now having the President of KFC apologize to America through a youtube video.  Both Oprah and KFC should have realized that this type of promotion had the makings of disaster. I was one of the lucky ones to actually redeem my coupon but I could not get the grilled chicken or my choice of sides as advertised on the coupon. I had to settle for a substitution of the original recipe and coleslaw with mashed potatoes. I was not mad at them for the substitution and I really appreciated them still honoring the coupon even though they had run out of the grilled chicken. But I was one of the lucky ones because now there is only a “Rain Check” waiting for anyone willing to bring their Oprah/KFC coupon into a KFC location.  Check out the details below.

rain_check_kfc

One good learning experience that came out of this mess for both KFC and Oprah was the marketing impact this offer had on both their brands. This will be an obvious case study on what not to do with a free meal offer.

The Twitter impact was also both good and bad. KFC and Oprah were both top trends for the past few days almost bringing the Twitter platform to a halt. This serge of traffic pushed Oprah’s followers over 900k but only increased KFC to just over 2k.

I in turn got a Tweet from KFC to my @jbrath twitter account saying they would make good on me not getting to sample the Kentucky Grilled Chicken with my free coupon.  They kfc_tweet2instructed me to send them a DM and they would take care of me.  So KFC its on you to redeem yourself to me and all those millions of people who were turned away empty handed with no grilled chicken on behalf of Oprah.

I will update this blog post with the KFC answer to my DM.

Let me know your thoughts

JB

Categories
Fortune 500 Twitter Twitter News

Fortune 500 Women CEOs And Their Twitter Status

I was very disappointed with this list of  Women CEO.  I could not find one of these women on Twitter.  Worse of all is that only 5 of the 15 companies  headed by these woman are on Twitter.

I think I was most disappointed in Avon not having an official Twitter presence since they are one of the most popular consumer brands with millions of women customers.  I think Twitter would be an amazing asset for a company like Avon. Especially as a customers support tool for its legions of independent sales reps. Twitter could also be a great lead generator for Avon’s  sales force.  I just did a twitter search of “Avon Makeup” and came up with hundreds of conversation all commenting on Avon products.

Of the 5 companies that have a twitter presence, Yahoo of course has the most followers with just over 10,000. Then it drops down to PepsiCo with just over 1500 and then it takes a dramatic drop with Xerox at just over 500, DuPont with 125, and Western Union with just 25.

Maybe these ladies should take a lesson from Oprah who currently has close to 500k followers at this time and will have a million by the end next month.  Oprah just got on Twitter a few days ago but I can bet you she has big plans on how she will capitalize on her use of this new communication service.

Fortune 500 Women CEOs 2009

Pat Woertz – Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) – No. 27

Angela Braly – Wellpoint (WLP) – No. 32

Lynn Elsenhans – Sunoco (SUN) – N0. 41

Indra Nooyi – PepsiCo (PEP) – No. 52  http://twitter.com/pepsico

Irene Rosenfeld – Kraft Foods (KFT) – No. 53

Ellen Kullman – DuPont (DD) – No. 75   http://twitter.com/DuPont_News

Mary Sammons – Rite Aid (RAD) – No. 100

Carol Meyrowitz – TJX (TJX) – No. 131

Anne Mulcahy – Xerox (XRX) – No. 147   http://twitter.com/XeroxEvents

Brenda Barnes – Sara Lee (SLE) – No. 199

Andrea Jung – Avon Products (AVP) – No. 255

Laura Sen – BJ’s Wholesale Club (BJ) – No. 269

Susan Ivey – Reynolds American (RAI) – No. 294

Carol Bartz – Yahoo (YHOO) – No. 345   http://twitter.com/yahoo

Christina Gold – Western Union (WU) – No. 451   http://twitter.com/WesternUnion

So ladies I am officially calling all of you out when it comes to your non Twitter presence.  Lets not let all the celebrities, entertainers and sports figures grab all the glory on Twitter.  Madam CEOs you may now Tweet, Follow or just get out of the way.

All the best

JB
@twarketing