Social media has become an incredibly important part of a brand’s public image – so when there is a mistake, it’s practically impossible to handle it quietly.
But the team who runs the Twitter feed for McDonald’s displayed an incredible skill for steering into the skid after an incomplete tweet appeared to be mistakenly sent out to the restaurant chain’s 168,000 followers.
The tweet showed up early on Friday morning, reading: ‘Black Friday **** Need copy and link****.’
Oops! McDonald’s was mocked by social media users after appearing to send out an incomplete tweet
Going big: The tweet went out in the early hours of Friday morning to the restaurant chain’s 168,000 followers
Given the clear mis-tweet, Twitter users were swift to poke fun at the account and eventually made the tweet go viral with more than 23,000 retweets.
Users joked that the tweet had to be the result of sleepy interns and offered up a plethora of characters cringing in gifs. One even responded with a block of Lorem Ipsum dummy text.
‘This will probably get more awareness than their originally planned tweet…’ mused another clever tweeter.
Even one of McDonald’s’ biggest competitors, Wendy’s, piled into the fun, writing: ‘When the tweets are as broken as the ice cream machine.’
But to the McDonald’s social media team’s credit, they didn’t remove the mistake. Instead, they made the best out of an embarrassing situation.
Jumping in: Wendy’s even joined the fray, comparing the mistake to the chain’s infamously frequent ice cream machine problems
Out of the park: But the brand managed to save face with this joking tweet sneaking in a promotion for McCafe coffee
After hours of being mocked for the flub, the brand tweeted out a follow-up, along with a man working in a newsroom taking a swig from a McCafe coffee cup.
‘When you tweet before your first cup of McCafé… Nothing comes before coffee,’ reads the tweet.
Users went nuts for the response, with the general consensus being that the brand had pulled off a ‘good save.’
It isn’t the first time that McDonald’s Twitter account served up a royal goof. Just earlier this year, the account tweeted out an insult to President Donald Trump.
The tweet, which appeared on the account in March, read: ‘@realDonaldTrump You are actually a disgusting excuse of a president and we would love to have @BarackObama back, also you have tony hands.’
The posting was removed an hour after it went up on the account, and the company later addressed the offensive tweet, writing that the account had been ‘compromised’.