5 Social Media Lessons From A Chapstick Facebook Fiasco

I am inspired by something that I read. Inspired to use Chapstick? No, but rather, inspired to write down five lessons that I thought of while reading this article:
Chapstick Gets Itself in a Social Media Death Spiral | Adweek.

I would hope that all of us could learn some basics from this scenario, let alone companies the size of Pfizer (Chapstick):

1. Social Media is Here to Stay
Deleting comments doesn’t make them as if they never existed. Behaving as if we can go back to the old style (pre-sm) marketing, where fan letters and comments come by snail mail and do not need to be acknowledged publicly, doesn’t work in the ever-present, in-your-face, social media world. Not only is social media here, now, it is here to stay.
2. Social Media Is About “Having A Voice”
In social media, the people have a voice, trying to silence them only gets them shouting louder and louder. It certainly doesn’t make them go away. Deleting comments, as shown in the comment (image), above, only serves to infuriate people.
3. Social Media is About Relationships
Giving platitudes doesn’t ring as true as a sincere apology. Ok, maybe it was sincere… Does it lead us to questioning? The internet provides way too much information for us to be pacified so easily, without an accompanying “feeling” of goodwill and “feeling” of sincerity.
4. Social Media is About Information
We are on the information highway, we can get information and give information easily. Trying to hide, after the fact, just doesn’t work any more. In the old days, you could throw away the fan mail. Now, there is a record, even cache records, of what happens on this highway.
5. The Bottom Line That Never Changes
Are companies interested in selling their product? Then, don’t mess around with Social Media. It simply doesn’t make the profit.

All that said, I must give the disclaimer that I have not spoken to Chaptick directly, this is all based on the article, above. Also, I didn’t just fall off the turnip truck and this could be a marketing ploy. Either way, I’m sticking with Burt’s Bees instead of Chapstick. Is that because of this ad fiasco or because I like Burt’s Bees better?