Here's one from the vaults: back in 2012 McDonald's launched a Twitter campaign asking users to share their warm and fuzzy stories about the fast food giant. 

However instead of some social McLovin' the campaign was soon causing McDonald's more pain than posting  a Big Mac's calorie count.

Social fail with the lot

It all started when McDonald's launched a Promoted Twitter campaign under the innocent sounding #MeetTheFarmers hashtag, designed to showcase the connection between McDonald's and its suppliers.

What might have been a successful social foray was soon upset when McDonald's decided to add the hashtag #McDStories, inviting Twitter users to share their fondness for the brand.

Twitter noticed alright, and responded by launching the bashtag #McDHorrorStories.

A Un-Happy Meal

Pretty soon users were jumping on board with a range of anecdotes about McDonald's that ranged from poor employee conditions to health and hygiene horrors. Some tweets included:

– “These #McDStories never get old, kinda like a box of McDonald’s 10 piece Chicken McNuggets left in the sun for a week”.

– “One time I walked into McDonalds and I could smell Type 2 diabetes floating in the air and I threw up. #McDStories”.

– “Ate a McFish and vomited 1 hour later….The last time I got McDonalds was seriously 18 years ago in college”.

McFailure

McDonald's quickly realised things weren't going as planned and rolled out the #littlethings hashtag to diffuse some of the abusive tweets, but to no avail. Two hours after launch McDonald's pulled the campaign, but couldn't do anything to quell the now trending #McDHorrorStories.

Eventually McDonald's signalled defeat and released the following statement.

“As Twitter continues to evolve its platform and engagement opportunities, we’re learning from our experiences,” Rick Wion, McDonald’s social media director, said in a statement to the L.A. Times.

Take-aways

History shows us that posting an open-ended hashtag on Twitter can lead to social strife. If McDonald's had had stuck to the #MeetTheFarmers hashtag, we might not be debating this now. 

McDonald's also lost points for not engaging with many respondents on Twitter and ignored most of the criticism – which just flame-grilled the fire.

The lesson for the rest of us? Think about how your hashtags can be interpreted, misinterpreted and even hijacked. Only then proceed – and then with caution. 

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