Soldiers’ Video Shows Accuracy of SIPA Keynoters
Anyone who attended this week’s SIPA 2011 Conference in Washington, D.C. is nodding his or her head after hearing about the U.S. soldiers’ now-viral video response to Delta Airlines’ “fourth-bag” charges. David Meerman Scott, the featured SIPF Awards Luncheon speaker on Tuesday, spoke about real-time marketing and PR—the concept that what you do now to react to an event is far more important than planning for two months out.
The idea that American soldiers can post a video to air their complaints—although it has been “officially” taken down after about 200,000 views—really amplifies the mainstream power that videos now possess. Speaking to us now, Scott would ask, “what’s the second paragraph?” In other words, who else can take advantage of this situation? Other airlines certainly. DisneyWorld? Perhaps. Delta has tried hard to turn down the volume. Give them credit for leaving up the 248 probably, all-negative responses to their Tuesday blog posting titled “Military Travel: Baggage Policies & Our Thoughts.”
To recap, U.S. soldiers returning from Afghanistan on Tuesday—after enduring an 18-hour layover in Baltimore-Washington Airport—were told by Delta that their fourth bags would each cost $200 for the flight to Atlanta, for a total of $2800. So two of the soldiers—on board the plane!—made a video and posted it to YouTube. In the video, titled “Delta Airlines Welcomes Soldiers Home,” the two staff sergeants clearly state their case. “The tools I used to protect myself and Afghan citizens while I was deployed [were in that bag],” Robert O’Hair says. The other sergeant—Fred Hilliker of Allendale, Mich.—closes the video with “Good business model, Delta. Thank you…”
So what would be the lessons from Scott—and Monday keynote speaker Josh Bernoff? Certainly, as Scott said, “Act NOW before your window of opportunity vanishes.” And “understand the power of now.” Would the video have had the same power next week or if the soldiers were not on the plane? Probably not. It had to have the immediacy of just having happened.
Empower your employees to make key decisions, Bernoff preached. What if the Delta employees had the authority to waive that fee? Lots and lots of bad publicity would have been avoided. In fact, you can say that it could have gone the other way and Delta might have even been able to cleverly announce its changing of the rules—before anything bad happened—to assist the returning U.S. soldiers.
“Social media are tools,” Scott said. “Real-time is a mindset.” Maybe because of what they do and the danger involved, soldiers do think more in the real-time. Something else Scott said is important that I mentioned here a couple days ago. He wants to see real faces on your website—and I think we can guess—in your videos as well. Look at this screen grab from the soldiers’ video. That’s a real face, not one off of a recruiting poster. People respond to that; it lends an air of authenticity. And develop real-time guidelines, Scott said. “If something happens, does someone have the autonomy to act?”
Who owns the second paragraph here? It’s hard to say yet. I saw blog posts from places like “PlaneReality” and “Overhead Bin.” But time should soon tell who steps up here to grab the headlines and dollars. But one thing is certain: the SIPA Conference was on the cutting edge on this one. Talk about it one day, see an example the next. Better stay tuned.
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