The gist of it for those too lazy to click: Who can type the longest 'om nom nom' in the comments below?
Makes you want to hurt things, doesn't it?
But it would be unfair to highlight the Colonel for doing social an injustice when it happens on countless other accounts every day too.
Here is a summary of some of the biggest social sinners and the reason why each time I see them another part of my soul jumps off a tall building into a burning pit of despair.
CARLING
I hate to go on about how awful Carling is online (I'm lying, I enjoy it quite a bit) but they seem to have totally ignored my previous blog posts about them so I'm going to have to keep on doing it until they learn. Spot the issues with one of their latest updates. Okay, EVERYTHING is wrong, but let's be specific. For a start it's a really boring picture of what is meant to be an exciting new product. Then they've used really odd grammar and have capitalised the word 'hint' for no obvious reason. They go on to imply that we should all have a Zest for winter. What is a zest? Why should I have one? What the hell are you talking about, Carling? They also capitalised the 'w' on winter, which is odd as it ain't a proper noun, dick'eds.
VIRGIN
You know Richard Branson? He's really very rich and owns a lot of big companies. He's probably got quite a hefty advertising budget, so why would he be afraid of sacking whoever comes up with Virgin's social media updates? It's odd, isn't it? This obvious stock photo of a bunch of business people (I imagined they searched for 'business people with cases') was put on Virgin's Facebook page along with the obscure copy above. There was also a link to a blog about how to become a good entrepreneur. Odd. The page isn't just for the airways, it's for the entire Virgin group, which means it is littered with odd pictures of stiff business people in airports and the occasional link to a Branson video. It looks like the hell where all other brand's shit updates went when they died.
O2
The O2 man on Twitter is one of my heroes. I don't know who he is and for all I know he has killed in the past, but his responses to customer queries are the sort of thing every community manager longs to be able to say. In short, they do Twitter well.
I can only imagine, then, that it isn't the same guy who does their Facebook page. There is no specific update that I think is particularly shoddy here, they're all very much of a similarly average caliber, but it's the engagement with the people commenting that is rubbish. No matter what boring, salesman type update O2 post, the response they get seems to be the same: My phone doesn't work. Why won't you fix it? There's a spree of unanswered messages of this ilk on their page and the chirpy, witty, sometimes irreverent tone of their Twitter page is nowhere to be seen.
ASDA
Caption: Fill in the blank: "My favourite thing about Christmas is ______"
I hate fill in the blank updates. I hate them so much that if one was wearing a skimpy dress and came up to me at the end of a night in a club I would throw my drink over it and decline its offer of sloppy sex. It's lazy, it's boring, it's predictable and it makes me cross. Of course it doesn't have to be this way, if it was actually a clever fill in the blank update that would be fine. I once asked fans of a certain brand of cider to do a crossword puzzle on their Facebook page and I'm fairly sure at least 2 of them got the answer right! But this update from Asda is just dull. It's not brand specific, it's not inventive and it is the exact same as approximately 1,000,000 other brands will do in the run up to the festive season.
There are plenty of other crap examples out there that I'm sure you'll see popping up on your newsfeed when all you really want is to check out the latest pictures of that girl you like getting a bit too close to another guy. What's he got that I haven't, eh? You'll see. One day you'll see!
And for the record, my favourite think about Christmas is M&S shortbread. Go home, Asda.