Fast Food, Fast Reactions: On most days the fact that a McDonald’s employee who was working at the drive-through window jumped out of it to help an unconscious customer, an off-duty police officer, whose car with two small children inside was rolling slowly away, would have been the brand’s top story. Unfortunately an item about a hack of the brand’s official Twitter feed, @McDonald’sCorp, quickly eclipsed the heroic act of Pedro Viloria in Doral, FL, which possibly saved several lives. A March 16 tweet on the official corporate Twitter account bashed President Donald Trump, saying, “You are actually a disgusting excuse of a President…also you have tiny hands.” The Ronald-to-Donald tweet gathered in excess of 2,000 retweets and likes (and now plenty of press) before the brand deleted it. After the deletion, McDonald’s tweeted: “Twitter notified us that our account was compromised. We deleted the tweet, secured our account and are now investigating this.” It refused to respond to questions. A bit later it issued the following statement: “Based on our investigation, we have determined that our Twitter account was hacked by an external source. We took swift action to secure it, and we apologize this tweet was sent through our corporate McDonald’s account.” What can brands learn from the Golden Arches’ handling of this incident? “Having a quick response time is key to gaining control of a situation like this,” North 6th Agency CEO Matt Rizzetta tells us. “Addressing the issue head-on and being completely transparent…[is] imperative. Consumers want to know a solution is being worked toward in the midst of an unstable circumstance.” Trump appeared in a McDonald’s commercial years ago and tweeted a picture of himself eating the brand’s french fries during his presidential campagin.
The Long Tail? An ironic pairing of items in the NY Times March 16 provides additional evidence that the tail of a crisis can be long. The top business story that afternoon reported on Wells Fargo’s ousted CEO John Stumpf, who forfeited $41 million in unvested stock awards as part of his penance for last September’s bogus credit card scandal. Don’t weep for him, though. The 34-year bank veteran, who insisted early on that Wells Fargo’s culture was sound despite firing 5,300 employees over the incident, took home $83 million in pretax earnings. His successor, Timothy Sloan, who forfeited his cash bonus and some stock, earned $13 million in 2016, up from $11 million in 2015. The bank’s board says it will release findings of its investigation into the credit card scandal next month. The next item in the Times’ Deal Book roundup noted German officials had conducted a search of the Munich offices of Jones Day, the U.S. law firm Volkswagen hired to conduct an internal investigation of its emissions-cheating scandal. The Times suggested the search indicates VW may have held back important documents. VW admits its employees were involved in the cheating, although no member of its current management was involved, the company says. Both VW and Wells Fargo have paid substantial fines yet still face lawsuits. On the other hand, maybe we’ve made too much of all this. Wells Fargo shares traded at a record high this month and VW overtook Toyota as the world’s biggest car seller in 2016.
Deals & Expansion: WE acquired Red Bridge Communications of Shanghai, China. The agency will be known as WE Red Bridge. Founder Penny Burgess will be its leader. WE also acquired WATATAWA of Singapore. WATATAWA managing partner Simon Pangrazio will lead it with chairman Bill Rylance, who’ll take on a global role with WE. – DS Simon Media has created a unit dedicated to using video to advance in-house experts as influencers. Brands need to “overcome the instinct to automatically go outside” for influencers, DS Simon CEO Doug Simon tells us. “Data show outside spokespeople underperform your experts and can be wildcards [who] create headaches.”
Strategies, Porter Novelli
People: Porter Novelli named Eddie Garrett EVP, global digital strategies. He’ll be based in Chicago and report to Nick Propper, COO and chief client officer. A former Porter Novelli employee, Garrett most recently was EVP, head of strategy, at Weber Shandwick. – WE named Scott Friedman EVP and added him to the agency’s technology sector team. Most recently, Friedman was founder and CEO of The Lede Agency. – Another technology appointment has PAN Communications naming Jennifer Malleo as VP in its San Francisco office, which has grown due to recent B2B tech client wins. Malleo was SVP for SutherlandGold. – Pollock lured Mahlori Isaacs from FleishmanHillard to direct its media department as a VP. – Deveney named CFO Chris Costello and senior account executive Carrie DeVries partners. Costello joined Deveney in 2005, DeVries in 2012. – Congrats to the nice folks at Olive PR, celebrating eight years in business with a colorful new rebrand and website.