Pizza Hut made news in April when it announced a competition looking for a summer “Twintern”. This individual’s primary duty would be to engage users via the company’s Twitter account while also using Facebook and other social media tools. The Twintern is responsible for building Pizza Hut’s following in the social media space and managing the overall brand image in this new, socially enabled, online world.
Pizza Hut chose 22-year old college graduate Alexa Robinson after a relatively competitive and well-publicized hiring round. So far Robinson has done a fantastic job, increasing Pizza Hut’s followers from 3,000 to almost 15,000. In comparison, main rival Domino’s has a shade under 3,000 followers. Robinson has done this through friendly interaction with Pizza Hut fans while offering incentives ranging from special Pizza deals to exclusive Pizza Hut information. Due in large part to the efforts of Robinson, Pizza Hut has dominated rivals over the past 30 days in terms of aggregate social media mentions.
More importantly, the insightful and friendly “Twintern” could help prevent and minimize the damage should a PR crisis arise. Ask Domino’s about the power of social media after two employees filmed a kitchen prank and subsequently placed the video on YouTube. The video generated a lot of negative buzz and a huge backlash against the Domino’s brand. Over the past 30 days Pizza Hut has benefited greatly from the twintern, buzz around Pizza Hut is an astounding 82% positive.
However, some have wondered out loud if hiring an experienced college grad for such an influential position is wise. One the one hand, a young social-media-connected college grad is just the kind of person that can immediately immerse themselves in the Twitter arena, while on the other hand, an individual with nearly no prior knowledge of the brand and no experience dealing with social media and/or public relations will likely struggle to come up with the right decision-making and strategy should a social media-related crisis arise.
This is a topic that was covered in great detail by one of Zeta Interactive’s own social media specialists, Valarie Bastek, and she makes some very valid points about the potential short comings of leaving these types of activities to a summer intern (Note: Valarie was referring to SEO link building outreach, but in today’s marketing climate, the line between “Twintern” and link-building specialists is extremely blurred). It’s hard to argue with the idea that a seasoned social media engagement specialist can bring the type of ideas and experience that can make the difference in terms of avoiding hidden pitfalls and maximizing tangible ROI for the business.
Still, despite questions about the experience level of their hire, Pizza Hut and their “Twintern” provide a solid proof of concept for managing the emerging power of the social media space. I’m willing to bet that many other powerful brands will hire twinterns or something along those lines (perhaps a dedicated Social Media specialist from a respected digital marketing agency) for intensive management of Twitter and other social media channels.
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