For those of you who may not have heard, Skittles has recently launched a new website. Instead of bringing you a taste of the rainbow through a flashy site that offers product giveaways, colorful contests, and a branded interactive experience, they have chosen to leverage what YOU the consumer are saying about them by utilizing existing social media outlets, such as Youtube, Twitter, Facebook, Wikipedia, etc…
To Skittles credit, in the past few years they have been very brave with their ad campaigns and branding. Some of their commercials rank among my favorites with their off-the-wall concepts. But I have to wonder what is this new risky venture into social media saying about their brand? Already I have seen attempts from saboteurs twittering racist rants coupled with the #skittles hashtag. Are they really going to hand over the reigns to us?
Their strategy so far has just been to point us to the conversations that are occurring at the moment about Skittles. That’s it. And to that, I say BIG DEAL…but what benefit does the consumer get from seeing your Wiki page, or becoming a Skittles facebook friend? Is there really a brand culture that exists for Skittles, where taking this type of approach is going to help foster their brand? They are certainly getting plenty of PR buzz by taking a page from Modernista‘s playbook. But is that sustainable? How quickly will this schtick become tiresome?
This approach is still new. What I hope to see is that they will carry forth that edginess that was in their campaigns and engage us! What off-the-wall innovation is Skittles going to bring to these conversations? How will they wow us? And what are they going to do with their products to BACK IT ALL UP!
I know you are watching, Skittles, but are you listening?
The reigns have been handed to us for years regarding brands. Whether it’s on their site or some obscure blog, we as consumers and online users already shape people’s perception of skittles.
The web is full of saboteurs everywhere you look and actions must be taken to mitigate the risk (such as filters) but it’s no reason not to embrace and accelerate what already exists.
I look forward to see what comes next once the buzz and saboteurs settle.