More and more we’ve seen the power and influence of public opinion on the way Brand’s behave. Tweeting, status updating, ‘liking’ and blogging by brands and consumers alike have meant the gap between the two are closing. While this has meant the brand and target can engage in a more intimate dialogue to derive unique consumer insights and instant campaign measurability, recent PR Twitterstorms have shown the implications of instantaneous and freely-flowing conversations between brand and audience.

Take the recent public backlash against Kyle Sandilands’ slagging of reporter, Sarah Stevenson. This incident didn’t cause uproar because it was out-of-character, in fact it was completely on-brand for Kyle. Compared to some of his comments in the past there was no reason why his comments couldn’t have been forgotten after the chorus of the next song. However, the key differentiator in this episode was Twitter. As Tim Burrowes (mumbrella.com.au) so interestingly surmised: ‘If Twitter hadn’t allowed the public instant feedback to the show, Stephenson never would have written that story, without social media, information wouldn’t be shared that quickly and the blow torch would not have been applied as quickly and aggressively as it was onto the sponsors.’

When pressure came from campaigners bombarding Australia’s top brands to pull advertising from Austereo until Kyle was dumped, a deluge of big-name brands responded and demonstrated their ‘brand integrity’ by cancelling advertising with 2dayFM. By doing so they seemingly contradicted the very brand values they aligned themselves with by initially sponsoring the program. Could it be that we have undervalued the power of the tweeting demographic in determining the values of a brand?