3 things to consider about “too fat” for Southwest Airlines

marketing and business — Tags: , , — ramseymohsen @ Tuesday, February 16th, 2010 - 12:16 am

Many of the blog posts you’re likely reading about Kevin Smith (the dude in Mall Rats) getting kicked off the plane for “being to fat” are centered around discussion if the policy is fair or possible to objectively make the decision that someone is too fat …I’d rather not talk about that (the full story / tweet recap is here).

I want to make 3 points about things you might not have considered when tracking this story:

1.) Kevin Smith, is a C-list actor offline, but online, he’s got major influence (over 1.6 million followers on Twitter). My point is your influence offline vs. online doesn’t always transcend (e.g. even when people like Bill Gates tweet, he doesn’t have the influence that Ryan Seacrest has online).

2.) When you read the official corporate response -then- the blog post from Southwest, it’s interesting to note the tone, language and style difference used between the official corporate communication response vs. the blog post- which is written from a “human” (not legal speak), it’s opinionated, self-deprecating and translates the situation to the lowest common denominator. The blog post just uses common sense towards the situation. Southwest has a clear understanding of the tools and how to communicate with them.

2a.) If you review the comments on the blog, what’s evident is their efforts of engagement directly with their fans is playing to their advantage. MANY of the fans are speaking on their behalf, coming first to the defense of Southwest …all because of their loyalty and connection to the brand.

3.) There is something is to be said about the powerful effect of building relationships and connections online. In this case, Southwest’s online community was quick to assemble and defend them even in the mix of a PR mess. If Southwest wanted 1 proof-point ROI on social media, they could take this one incident and just measure the positive sentiment from it’s fans, it’s incredible to watch (so is the exchange between fellow loyalists).

What’s your opinion? Do you think Southwest is handling this properly?
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CE12

One of the responses to the original Southwest statement nailed it when they said that Southwest should of had their #1 PR guy on this instead of one of their newbie's who's in her first job out of college. They didn't handle this very well at all and it wasn't until they woke up and smelled the tweets that they regrouped and got their top people on this.

Btw, you forgot about the movie Dogma. I thought it was much better than Silent Bob or Clerks. That might of been due to Alanis Morrisette playing God doing handstands and the plethora of A and B list actors which included Matt Damon and Ben Affleck taking on the roles of the bad angels who wreak havoc and kill humans for the hell of it.It was a nice morality tale. I also like the bar scenes too.

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ramseymohsen

Thanks for sharing your thoughts Ross and Ekey.

I think you're both right, the "civilized" response certainly is not going unnoticed. Furthermore, they're devoting resources to it having published in multiple channels, so it's certainly not being swept under the carpet.

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Ekey

Considering this all erupted on a Saturday and by Sunday SW had multiple tweets, a blog post and media releases out by the afternoon, I think they handled well.

Usually, you might see a company this large get defensive and then wait until later in the week to address it head on as SW did.

More importantly, SW took a great stand with "The Customer is not always right" kind of attitude. Kudos to them for standing up to someone who, I think, now looks kind of like a bully.

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Ross

Great post and a solid way of looking at the situation. I think that Southwest is handling this situation to the best of their ability. When it comes down to it, they apologized and they have been civil with their approach. Kevin Smith has turned this thing upside down and ultimately made it a publicity stunt to get his name back in the headlines. The guy hasn't been in the news since Jay & Silent Bob strikes back and now he has an opportunity to get his name back in lights.

Like any organization would do, Southwest offered an apology and on top of that gave this man a voucher. It wasn't enough for Mr.Smith but what is enough? He hasn't made any requests, that I'm aware of anyways... Unless his tweet about them making an airline for fat people was serious. I think he may be looking for SWA to change the policy all together but I think that would be a bit much. At the end of the day SWA is an organization trying to keep their customers comfortable. I agree that they could of handled the situation better but when someone doesn't even know what they want - You cant offer it to them.

Apparently, sorry just doesn't cut it anymore...

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  1. www.ramseymohsen.com – Ramsey Mohsen; web consultant, DJ, video blogger, lifecaster & internet addict. » Bill Gates vs. Ryan Seacrest; “Who has more influence?” says:
    February 17, 2010 at 1:51 am

    [...] ryan seacrest, test, testing — ramseymohsen @ Wednesday, February 17th, 2010 – 1:51 am My last blog post mentioned online influence. I explained that your influence offline vs. online doesn’t always [...]


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