Branding Collides with Social Networking

This is a perfect example of how powerful the media is. By simply posting a video on youtube, within a few days, more than a million people viewed this prank and associated it with Dominos. Even though only two people from one Domino's store took part in this prank, the entire company is taking the hit. Its amazing how fast something like this can spread, but how long it will take for the company to overcome the negative associations with their product. Because of the ignorance of two employees, Dominos ratings will probably suffer for quite a while.

This is a demonstration of the availability heuristic. The availability heuristic is a phenomenon in which people base the frequency of an occurrence based on how easily an example can be brought to mind. Even though this probably dosn't happen very much, people will belive that it happens more frequently simply because this example is fresh in their minds. Because this prank is prevalent in everyone's minds, many people will probably not order Dominos for a long time, if ever again, because they associate this type of behavior with the Dominos company. The emotional impact of this one example becomes much more important than the actual statistical probability of it happening again. I myself have only ate Domino's pizza a few times, and this publicity is definitely not making me want to eat there again any time soon. This is a perfect example of how a single prank/example can become considered as representative of the whole company rather than just a single example of two people playing a stupid prank.

Here is an "apology" by Dominos. Hmmmmm, I think a teleprompter may be involved here, but he did a great job of covering it up!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7l6AJ49xNSQ

I think stories like this have a much bigger impact today than in years past. This is due to the massive increase in the media, as it has grown exponentially even in the last 10 years. Imagine if an incident like this had occurred 50-60 years ago. What would be the ramifications for the company? At the very worst, the story would get printed in the newspaper, and it might even make the news on TV (for those who actually had televisions). Comparatively, even though the act was the same, it would've had a much lesser impact back then simply due to the smaller audience. Much less scrutiny would be brought to the company, and I'm willing to bet that the whole ordeal would be pretty much forgotten about in a short period of time. However, in today's media environment, this scandal can rage out of control in a matter of hours, literally. Anyone with an internet connection could log onto YouTube and check the video out, not to mention read various blogs and reports from other online media outlets. In 10% of the time, this incident has now reached 1000% of the impact as compared to if it occurred in the past.

The media is so big nowadays that anyone in the spotlight must constantly be aware of what they're doing and saying. Any little slip of the tongue or off color comment could be taken out of context, and a huge scandal could develop because of it. Because the media can reach millions in such a short period of time, everyone needs to be aware of their actions and the potential consequences. I see this all the time in sports. Athletes will make rather benign comments that they probably think won't have much of an impact, then a day later they find themselves in a whirlwind of controversy because of their actions. This story is just a reminder that the media is ever present, and if you would happen to slip up while in the limelight the consequences will probably be way worse than you could ever imagine.

This story has got a lot to do with cognitive psychology, and in particular perception, like the other posts have mentioned. Humans tend to heavily rely on their previous experiences. Most of us have seen other stunts like this involving disgusting food habits. While we may not know the reason behind this particular prank, our preconceived ideas will most likely identify this situation and the two perpetrators in a very negative light. Unfortunately, because advertisers have become so great at branding, too, we will associate Domino's with this negative perception. While this is something that is most likely not very common, it will be hard for us to divorce the disgusting prank from Domino's for a long time.

Also unfortunate for Domino's is the fact that we have sensory memories that can store information within a second. I saw only a tiny segment of the video clip on the Today show before turning away and changing the channel, but my stomach still squirmed when I read the article about the incident. Sensory and short-term memories are not stored indefinitely, however, so this is an advantage for Domino's. Hopefully, many of us will forget this incident in the future. I would say, though, that it will probably take some time for us to forget this, because it was such a shocking event.

On the one hand, it may be one of the worst times in history to be a celebrity or in the public eye because of the vast reach of the media today. People do need to watch what they say, do, take pictures of, post...it's almost like a private life is disappearing. This kind of reminds me of the Google article, in the sense that while there are a lot of disadvantages to the media, there are many benefits as well. Obama was able to gain a lot of attention and perhaps voters by using these social networking sites like Facebook and YouTube. Personally, I like being able to stay in contact with friends who are all over with these sites as well. It will be interesting to see what the next ten years bring in regards to these sites and any rules that will have to be imposed. Where do we draw the line between the personal and professional lives?

I think the really interesting thing about this is the time issue. We have had media for a long time, but it's only in recent years when media has become a vehicle for that instant gratification, and having everything you could possibly want at your fingertips in a second that we've started expecting things to be that way.

Media is absolutely powerful - as the previous posts have said. It has the power to tell us (or not tell us) anything. It also has the power to influence what we want, and what we know, and how we view the world. In this case, it has the power to reveal things that were best left unseen (in my book)... But now that it's online, and everyone is always at their computers, we assume that if we've seen the youtube video, then everyone has. We expect that in that very brief moment of time, everyone else will have seen and responded, especially those whom it affects.

But Domino's is a big company, and I'm guessing they're busy, and I'm thinking that nobody's sitting around watching youtube except that one weird guy in the mail-room, and really no one's asking for his input. But it's a natural expectation that if we've seen it, and the internet is so fast, well then everyone else must have seen it and be equally fast in responding.

There are good and bad sides to this. The good side is that with this instancy online, we are able to see things that would otherwise be mediated by some higher ups. There is more freedom to express things online, and more time before big-wigs tear it down. It's kind of nice in a way to know that it's not protected, because we know things aren't as censored or manipulated.

The bad side is that stupid crap like this from stupid people (pardon me for the judgment, please argue if you disagree) gets out there for the world, and if there had been any one single person who it had had to go through before hitting the viral tidal wave, perhaps poor Domino's (where to be honest, I'm probably done with forever) wouldn't be dealing with this crisis.

If I were adding psychology to my post (for some reason...) :) I would say that stress is a trifecta in this situation. The first stress is experienced (I would postulate) by the employees. Perhaps they are unsatisfied with their employment, or simply are not sufficiently stimulated at their place of employment. These small everyday stressors can lead to some odd coping strategies. Although most of us (who don't work in food service) may surf the net on days that our job is taxing us, others may find other means of entertainment to cope with their work stress or work boredom.

Their actions, however, have caused stress for two rather significant groups. One group is the group of people in the United States (and possibly the world) that has eaten at Domino's. Not only are we experiencing stress over these times that we have eaten there, but we also may be experiencing stress (at least in the coming few weeks or months) about the sanitary aspects of everything that we eat that we didn't directly make ourselves. Concern over the non-germy-ness of our food could be especially stressful, particularly for some people who are germ-o-phobic (I believe the technical term is spermophobia, but I prefer not to use that for fear of misinterpretation). So we, as a public audience to this "prank" feel the stress of it.

Finally, they have obviously caused stress for anyone else who is affiliated (as an employee or executive) at Domino's. They are already experiencing difficult financial and economical times, which is stressful already, and are now dealing with lawsuits and significant bad press and loss of customers. For a company as well as it's employees, this is stressful, and it is even more stressful to imagine the future job loss that may result.

In the end, what I'm saying is that the stress of the two people in the kitchen at Domino's caused a chain reaction of a lot of stress in a lot of people. Which is a bummer.

I'm not usually somebody who is grossed out very easily by something like this. I tend to tell myself that this happened a long way's away and it doesn't have much to do with me. However, rarely do I go to the restaurant/place in question to partake in some of their food right afterward. Why? Mostly because of my flashbulb memory.

When humans encounter a situation with some unusual, shocking or tragic characteristic, they tend to store this experience with a very detailed photographic-like image. It is called a "flashbulb" memory because it is almost like a flash went off and our minds took a picture of the situation. In this instance, I can imagine taking out a slice of Domino's Pizza and suddenly the image would pop into my mind of the guy tainting my food (even though in the video it was a sub). This actually happened in my home town...I was very young at the time and just remember the kids at school renamed Little Caesar's to Little Sneezers...I don't even know if the story was true, but the flashbulb memory has stuck in my mind and I won't eat there.

Psychologists speculate that the flashbulb memories had a sort of survival value by helping humans to remember serious or dangerous experiences. In today's world, the memories are still useful (in a way) by helping people remember exactly where they were and what they were doing during surprising/shocking events, like 911. In this Domino's instance, we might be picturing this crude event for a while, but no worries...it does eventually fade.

What amazes me in this article and media event is the extent these two employees were willing to go to get people's attention. Since attitudes are very closely tied to behaviors, I think these two employees' behaviors show the public that they were both obviously starving for attention and were willing to behave in an unprofessional manner to obtain attention. Apparently, the positivity or negativity of the attention the received really didn't matter to them; all Kristy and Michael wanted was to gain public attention and create a commotion. Obviously, their tactic got them a lot of public attention, but it also cost them both their jobs. I would really like to ask them, as they look back on their prank, if behaving in a manner that cost them their jobs was really worth the negative attention they received. I would also like to ask them if they had negative feelings towards Dominos because why would they behave in a way that not only jeopardized their jobs but also damaged the reputation of their employer. I am curious about whether these two employees were merely bored and trying to get public attention or actually had a problem with their employer and were trying to get even.

This article also provides a great demonstration of how powerful American media is. Towards the end of the article, someone is quoted as saying that, in social media, "if you think it’s not going to spread, that’s when it gets bigger." In this case, the disgusting video created a major uproar and had a major negative impact on the opinion of Dominos' customers and the company's business. Customers weren't even interested in finding out whether the video was either accurate or the sandwiches were actually served; the suggestion that the restaurant's employees would behave in this manner was enough to scare away customers. I think this is an excellent reminder to particularly college students that we need to be extremely careful about anything we choose to release on the Internet; although we may have made the post in fun, others may receive a much more negative impression.

I think the fact that youtube is so available to everyone and the news and media’s coverage of this event make it even worse for the Domino’s company. The fact that one can look up an event on youtube and watch it as many times as they want helps consumers to remember this specific event and associate it with all Domino’s stores. If information isn’t “rehearsed” it never makes the jump from short term memory into long term memory. The constant repetition of youtube videos, the news, twitter and other forms of media seems like a form of rehearsal to me. Many people most likely saw the video, spread the word to their friends and watched the video again with them. It’s also possible that people received information about this crisis for Domino’s on the news and then went to go and watch the full and original video online. Also, if this event is getting a lot of media coverage by news stations and other networks, the event is repeatedly being presented to the general public. Overall, the repetition of the video to the general public will cause people to remember this negative event better.

Another important aspect is that it wasn’t hearsay, but a video = visual image of the event taking place. I think visual images are a lot more powerful and effective than word of mouth. I think because the event could actually be seen in a video on youtube, we perceive it as being more real than hearsay. We have a sort of perceptual set that tells us that because I saw it with my own eyes it must have happened, even if it were only a video created by someone else. Many people might not have looked further into the issue to see if the food was actually delivered to the customers. The visual image also might have evoked such strong emotions of disgust out of viewers that they did not care whether or not the video was real. It’s also possible that seeing this video could cause a person to recall a memory of a time they ate Domino’s and associate it with this current event and wonder, was my food sanitary? Overall, I think the powers of visual perception and memory and the wide availability of the video contributed more to hurting Domino’s reputation than the actual event.

While reading this article, I kept finding myself thinking “why is this such a big deal?” Don’t get me wrong – this is pretty gross – but I feel that it is very cultural. In many other countries, especially third-world countries, many worse things happen to the food that people eat than this; however, it does not seem to be such a big deal there. There are some places that relish year-old plantains that have been baking underground. Our society, on the other hand, focuses on pristine conditions for food preparations. Year-old plantains would be expired, and therefore inedible. While it is nice to know that I am not eating something fouled by another’s personal substances, it seems that this obsession with food preparation is a developed-world concept, probably because we actually have choices in regards to what we eat. Other populations in third-world countries often must choose either to eat whatever food they are given or to go hungry – they are not concerned if someone’s hair is in their food. We have conditioned those who prepare our food to do so in as clean a manner as possible (which is not a bad thing!). Those restaurants that are known for cleanliness and good food receive more business, which is their reinforcement to continue achieving the same state of cleanliness and taste. When we find out that a restaurant has regressed to previous “unclean” behaviors, we punish them by taking our business elsewhere, as in the case of Domino’s. The company is being punished by society for not preparing food in society’s desired way.

Reputation is an area of social psychology which consists of how people view others. This situation is an example of how important reputation is not only people but companies as well. Companies rely on having a good reputation. Companies which gain a bad reputation lose customers and aren't able to continue existence for very long if they can't get their good reputation back.

This video is so damaging to Domino's because of the negative association which it has with the company's food. Seeing the food from a particular company be defiled can permanently or at least temporarily create an association in people's minds between the company's food and the disgusting things in the video. A single video like this one can undo millions of dollars worth of advertising and cost millions in lost sales. All from a simple video put together by only a couple people. Even if people know that this was only an isolated incident they still will probably think twice about ordering from Domino's in the near future.

This is a great example of how interconnected we have become. Information has the ability to travel very quickly. This is a situation which wouldn't have been possible before the internet. Domino's response to this was very good. They responded through their own video which was previously posted by Justin. By focusing their efforts through the same form of media that the problem came from they are able to more effectively make their response to the same people who would have seen the original video. Online social media can be both good and bad for companies and this situation shows both sides of this.