Avoiding a Social Media Trainwreck

If you're not going to answer the phone, why bother to install a line to begin with?

As a Longhorn, I can tell you that few things have been bigger news to Texas fans than the announcement that we're getting our own network. As I don't live in Texas anymore and often the games are now shown here in New Orleans in favor of some SEC game, I was especially looking forward to a dedicated Longhorn Network that would carry and broadcast all the games. And judging by the comments on the Longhorn Network Facebook Page I wasn't alone.

But like many things in life, the Longhorn Network isn't quite taking off like we all hoped it would -- specifically, from what I can tell from fan posts on the page, seems not a lot of folks are carrying the network. Which as you can see from the fan comments, isn't exactly making folks happy.

But what I want you to pay attention to here is the response from the Longhorn Network to this outpouring of negativity. Or maybe more properly stated, the lack of response. As of Friday, August 26th at 3:30p central time -- there wasn't any. In fact, I went back into the stream and outside of posts giving updates, encouraging folks to ask for the network and other PR oriented posts... there isn't any engagement at all. In fact, the only three comments I can find that the Longhorn Network made in response to fan comments was something along the lines of "go ask your provider to carry our channel." -- all of which came before the rash of negative comments/posts by fans over the last 24 hours.

Which takes me back to the first line of this post and the moral of the story -- business marketers, if you're not going to answer the social media phone, then don't establish service. If you're just wanting to "hold your name" then say so on your social media outlets. We're all big boys and girls and we can all understand that, we may wish you'd be here in the convo but we can understand you're not ready. But whatever you do, don't pretend to engage just because it's "free" or "hot" or "cool" to be in social media.

In the meantime, if anyone at the Longhorn Network or ESPN is reading... ring me at 504-383-4410... it pains me to see my alma mater's brand being handled so poorly.

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