58
59
CANADIAN INDUSTRY ONLINE - APRIL 2013
THE
UGLY
Subway customer Matt Corby
from Australia was innocently eating
the fast food chain’s signature “Foot
Long” sub, when he noticed that the
sandwich appeared smaller than ad-
vertised. He simply measured the
sandwich, and discovered it was 11
inches long. So he decided to post a
photo of his discovery on Subway’s
Facebook page, positioning his sub
next to a tape measure along with the
message “subway pls respond.” Mr.
Corby’s photo was seen by thousands
of Subway customers, and even result-
ed in copycat photos all over the social
networking site, including one featur-
ing a sandwich compared to a human
foot in a sock. Subway had a PR night-
mare on it’s hands, and had to respond
accordingly. Remarkably, some dis-
gruntled Subway customers even filed
lawsuits against the fast food chain,
claiming false advertising.
That is where we are with social
media today – it’s not going away.
When I address audiences, I remind
them that once upon a time, we would
lock our rotary telephones so employ-
ees wouldn’t ‘steal’ company resourc-
es by calling their relatives or friends
with the 800 telephone line. I also re-
call the head of legal storming into my
office exclaiming, “You’re not really
going to allow our employees to have
access to email, are you? They’ll steal
our intellectual property.” As we re-
flect back today, it is rather ridiculous
to think about these former ‘concerns.’
If you’re not embracing and le-
veraging social media, chances are the
external world already is. Your social
media stakeholders include former
employees, applicants, customers and
clients, vendors, the media, and even
the government. Sites such as
are increasingly becoming
popular with departing employees
who feel their companies did not treat
them fairly. One of the fastest growing
sites
for example, provides
individuals with their social media
‘
ranking.’ In the future, instead of ask-
SOCIAL MEDIA
