Social Media Monitoring for Dunkin' #part two

Who doesn’t know Dunkin’ in America? And who, nonetheless, chooses to go to Starbucks? Why is that? We are not going to conduct research on the consumer behavior or compare the quality of coffee, but rather evaluate how effective Dunkin’ is on social media as this is the main channel to reach the customers and draw their attention to the brand.

In the previous part of the social monitoring project we analyzed the social rates and statistics which indicated how engaged the customers are online. The figures appeared to be rather low which led to the conclusion that Dunkin’ needs to energize the groundswell more effectively to make it talk about the brand. After that Dunkin’ made an effort to encourage its customers to take part in the Halloween costume contest which turned into success as more than 500 followers posted pictures of them dressed up as donuts.

If we compare figures from the last and this week the campaign boosted such values as strength and reach, however, passion score has decreased significantly.

October 31 & October 17

The tendency of less people being willing to talk about DD repeatedly poses a threat  of losing the brand customers’ loyalty completely. The reason behind it may stem from the followers being discouraged to talk. This assumption is drawn on the fact that Dunkin’ is not involved in the two-way conversation with the groundswell. All the comments both on Instagram and Twitter are left unanswered, even those that contain complaints, requests or those posted by DD loyal customers.

Such negligence makes no difference between traditional marketing via mass media channels and digital marketing via social media platforms. However, the latter requires from brands talking to the groundswell, i.e. replying to their comments, if they want to reach the middle of the marketing funnel where consumers’ preferences and loyalty are formed and drive them to buy a product and spread a word about it (Li, Bernoff, p. 101).

Moreover, the groundswell is a valuable source of generating new ideas for the products but to know and implement them DD should also start listening. Otherwise, customers’ dissatisfaction would aggravate as their voices are not heard and their needs are not met.

It can be noticed that the prevailing number of complaints come from the most loyal customers who are upset about the company’s rebranding, i.e. dropping the word “donuts” from the logo. Unfortunately, DD completely ignores its customers’ concerns, explaining the company’s decision through funny videos but never reaching out to the customers personally. DD CEOs’ crucial mistake is to assume that the brand is all about them, but it is customers who are in charge and by making the brand customer-centric they would be able to win back those who became disappointed. Our suggestion in this respect would be to remind them why they liked DD in the first place. For example, Dunkin’ can run a social media campaign with the fancy hashtag #TellUSADunkinStory, which can be decoded as “tell us a Dunkin’ story” or “tell USA a Dunkin’ story” with the reference to its moto “America runs on Dunkin”. The idea is to share different stories about personal experience with DD like going to the store for the first time ever, meeting the love of life in the line for pumpkin spiced latte, photo shooting with donuts or eating ten of them at once because they are delish – anything that evokes warm feelings about DD. The authors of the best stories can be awarded with gift cards, discounts or free supplies. The underlying message of these stories would be the same as in videos, i.e. it is not the logo that matters but what stands behind it, however, the engagement of the groundswell might make it sound more compelling and reassuring.

The last point worth mentioning is that Dunkin’ would do better if it posts unique content on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook as these social media platforms have uneven following and require different strategies. For example, DD Facebook page has 15 million followers, but the content posted on it is tailored to Instagram, and the company itself asks people to go on Instagram. What if some of them don’t have a profile or just don’t want to post anything on it? Obviously, DD strives to gain more following on each social network, but it would be more considerate to let customers decide with which platform they would prefer to engage.

To recap, Dunkin’ recent attempts to energize the groundswell can be considered successful, but the company needs to learn to listen and talk. So far, no strong relationship has been built with the customers, while social media marketing resembles one-way shout rather than substantial conversation which may threaten customers’ loyalty in the long run.