TORONTO—After mounting a novel campaign to lure new customers on Twitter, a nationwide weight loss and nutrition company is conceding defeat.
The campaign, which was publicly lambasted by critics using the hashtag #FindFatty, saw the health firm’s social media team identifying potential candidates for their service through a random audit of avatars.
“While we’re pleased that this effort didn’t cost much to mount, relying on free social media and low-cost summer student labour, we’re obviously disappointed with the outcome, ” said Caroline Clarke, Chief Marketing Officer. “Our representatives would follow Twitter users that appeared to need our assistance, send a few tweets, and try to interest them in our expertise. I think the problem may have laid in the lack of unified messaging.”
The ‘messaging’ Clarke is referring to is the particular wording of the tweets sent. While some were quite delicately expressed, others were rather terse and direct.
“With a 140 character limit and a customer contact quota, I did the best I could,” said Dan Wendt, an engineering student. “Sure I could have sent multiple tweets, gradually bringing up the subject of their weight and our health supplements, but it was way more efficient to send out a thousand a day saying ‘You’re seriously fat. I can help. DM me for details.’ or ‘Yes, that’s a flattering cam angle. No, it isn’t fooling anyone. Not even you.'”
In his own defence, Wendt claimed that his signup rate wasn’t significantly less than average.
The weight loss company plans to use the lessons learned from this exercise to roll out a new campaign on Second Life.