Police arrested a 66 year old woman this week for refusing to pay her $7.45 tab at Waffle House. The story got picked up by Drudge Report, then the broader media and finally through blogs and social media networks.

This is not a bona fide PR crisis, but this situation reflects poorly on Waffle House, a national chain with ~1500 stores. Dumb criminals are entertaining, but reports aren’t clear about why she didn’t (couldn’t?) pay. Many bloggers are finding fault with the restaurant and railing against it. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, Google Blog Search]

The store manager probably should have discreetly waived the bill, although I can’t imagine they thought the situation would be elevated to national attention. Regardless, this is an opportunity for the company to define it’s relational strategies for crisis management and online consumer interaction.

Background: Waffle House Serves a Broad Base

Full disclosure: I love Waffle House. It’s a brand steeped in Diner Americana invoking the hot black coffee retreat painted by Edward Hopper. The all-day-breakfast menu is working class fuel, from pre-dawn to the deep night-shift. It’s the kind of place comfortable memories are made, from roadtrip pitstop adventures to the nighthawk’s final call.

Waffle House is a cultural icon rich in user-generated content. Click images to see Flickr comments.

Waffle House offers simple food, folksy patrons and they have some of the hardiest working & friendliest servers in the industry. Sitting next to the grill line when the place is slammed, the hot sizzle, greasy smells and barking orders is poetic to a business process nerd like me.

Recent Waffle House PR Challenges & Responses

Waffle House has already faced a series of bad press from unruly customers.

• October 2008 Robberies occur in Texas and Alabama. A fatal shooting Florida is met with calls for boycotts online.
• August 2008 LiveLeak has security video of a brawl complete with racist comments about Waffle House customers. The company should nail whoever is releasing these security videos to the public, although methinks it may have been released by plaintiff litigants who obtained them through the course of Discovery. Unfortunately, the damage is done; the company’s best response is being prepared next time.
• March 2008 Kid Rock pleaded not guilty for fighting in a Waffle House. I love the company’s response: they invited the star back to a restaurant to greet his fans and raise money for a local homeless shelter. Spokesperson Kelly Thrasher explains the company wanted to “take a negative situation and turn it into a positive situation.”

Waffle House brand managers should proactively apply this positive philosophy to social media. This recent series of events can be the impetus for a cohesive online PR strategy that touts the brand’s long-standing reputation for good customer service.

“When life gives you lemons, make lemonade!”
Grandma

What Should Waffle House Do?

I recommend a deep dive on some of these general actions.

• Develop an Online Persona
  One can expect resistance to social media from a brick-and-mortar diner chain, especially one that doesn’t advertise. Traditional PR might consult with Legal and publicly drop all charges. Or partner with local homeless services nonprofits.
   
  However, consumers have already extended the brand across social networks (more on that below). Blue collar audiences are online, 70% use social media and savvy brands are serving them.
   
  Whataburger is a Southern burger chain with a made-to-order heritage that targets men, 50+. It’s ad agency McGarrah-Jessee drives a polished effort online as well as in direct, outdoor and cool broadcast work reminiscent of my favorite down-home man-it-up Miller High Life spots.
   
  We tailored the BecomeAnEX campaign to help multiple shades of blue-collar audiences. We found a majority of our target already online and eagerly embracing mobile technologies.
• Engage Existing Communities
  My brief research uncovered a bevy of positive stories, pictures, a Wikipedia article and scores of cult-classic sentiments like this unassuming Waffle House Wedding in Georgia that would have been a hoot to crash. Git ‘er done!
   
  The alt.food.waffle-house Usenet group has 6000 members, there are YouTube videos, 1000s of pics on Flickr, large fan groups on Facebook and Ning and constant tweets on Twitter to name a few.
   
  Once brand managers know where people congregate online, they can enter discussions via PR and interactive advertising. I believe an approachable persona mixed in humurous kitsch and classic PR would be very well received in micromedia formats (@woot comes to mind).
• Develop Distinct Strategies for Each Platform
  Social media outlets are unique and some communities lend themselves to different business objectives (i.e awareness, response, promotion, revenue, feedback channels, etc). Plan accordingly.
• Leverage UGC
  Integrate user-generated content into Waffle House web properties.
• Attach the Brand to a Quirky Holiday
  Waffle House already does this to some extent. They are a sponsor of Real Men Cook, a family celebration event hosted on Father’s Day in Atlanta. Waffle House benefits with buzz marketing, product placement and celebrity endorsement.
   
  The company also celebrates National Waffle Week and hosts the World Waffle Eating Championship that garners press for it’s high-profile speed eaters.
   
  A cheap Quirky Holiday SEM Strategy could generate local press, elevate presence of mind & uptick sales for a couple days on an otherwise off-beat holiday. Eat What You Want Day [May 11] could be fun given their pick-n-choose menu. Other possibilities: Lips Appreciation Day [Mar 16] and No Housework Day [Apr 7].
• Update the “Newsroom”
  I’d wager the Waffle House Newsroom got a lot of hits today with this story. And it hasn’t been updated in over two years. Good media relations is critical.
• Web Analytics & PR Measurement
  Judging by the state of the site, and the apparent lack of a full-time PR manager, I’d wager executives don’t study inbound traffic sources. At one time, Waffle House partnered with Vocus for on-demand news monitoring and measurement. Hopefully company employs basic online monitoring.
• Implement a Brandjacking Defense Posture
  These are just the kind of one-off stories that instigate a brandjacking that will probably run it’s course in a few days. Even if this case probably will not hurt the brand long-term, why risk it? It appears @wafflehouse has already been brandjacked on Twitter and on Google’s Blogspot.
   
  Using my Social Media Checklist, Waffle House brand managers should snag social media profiles, even if it doesn’t actually engage followers.
• Speak to Security Concerns
  Customers need to feel safe. Be open about what security measures the company is taking and address flagrant misstatements when they occur. This requires active and passive online brand monitoring.
• New Price Points
  I’m not privy to current Waffle House pricing strategies, although, I do remember All You Can Eat deals for $3.99 in college! Brands have to be careful about competing on price when a depressed economy eventually recovers. However, this story got traction because of the economy; people will make a connection on price & this lady being unable to afford $7.45. A temporary high-level plan can hedge against public blowback.

Enterprise Strategies in Social Media

While PR focused on external messaging, Waffle House can use social media for internal infrastructure communications.

• Franchise Communications
  A few years ago, I got an internal sneak peak at Schlotzsky’s efforts to shore up internal communication among franchisees during a restructuring phase. I’d keep an eye out for anything that supported franchise relations specifically.
• Collaborate On Internet Messaging & Brand Identity
  Schlotzsky’s also addressed inconsistencies in external messaging, branding and stores across the franchise system, both in traditional and online advertising. From what I can tell, Waffle House is facing similar challenges today. Even after establishing a strict code of branding guidelines, policing and enforcement requires dedicated resources.
• Regional Online Marketing & Domainjacking Avoidance
  The lack of an online messaging strategy also puts the brand at risk for domainjacking. Franchises are already grabbing their own domain names, which is common when marketplace planning and legal don’t keep pace with technology.
   
  Waffle House should have a unified front in the WaffleHouse.com domain, improve the store locator & offer marketing pages for franchise owners so they can leverage the brand for local promotion. Following this, the company can develop strategies for regional online marketing & mitigate the risk of domainjacking.

Is this case study helpful? What would you suggest to Waffle House executives? Please share your thoughts below!

Reasons to Use GoDaddy

• Search Domains
  Their whois search is good at recommending similar domains. This is helpful during domain selection in the campaign’s creative strategy phase.
• Cheap Registration
  GoDaddy has always offered the most competitive registration rates for commercial domains. Be sure to get a significant discount using the GoDaddy promo codes from the Live Codes blog. This can be a significant savings the client will appreciate, especially when registering hundreds of domains purely in defense of domainjacking.
• Smooth Domain Administration
  GoDaddy offers one of the easiest control panels in the industry for domain renewals, DNS changes, domain transfers and bulk administration. Domainers can also lock accounts and plan auto-renewals for up to 10 years.
• Wide TLD Variety
  GoDaddy allows registration with a large number of top level domains, including some TLDs reserved for country codes and sponsored entities. Use the convenience of a single source.
• Flexible Terms On Hosting
  The GoDaddy hosting model is engineered for a high volume of low traffic sites. I once produced a campaign that generated so much traffic on GoDaddy servers, they had to temporarily take our site offline to move it to a different production environment. We got a surprise series of bills for the burstable load, our hosting bill jumped from $200 to nearly $20,000!

  Despite our success in marketing, I negotiated a significant price reduction. GoDaddy graciously agreed to accept a fraction of the cost, and they allowed us to move the campaign to a host provider better equipped to scale rapidly during traffic crunches.

• You Can Reach a Human Being
  Unlike many smaller registrars, you can talk to a real people at GoDaddy. Call (480) 505-8877. This can be crucial when dealing with odd situations like sponsored TLDs, renewals, transfers, emergency DNS administration or chasing down account access due to poor management during campaign staff turnover.
• Proactive Customer Service
  Update I got this brief voicemail from GoDaddy just checking in to make sure everything is a-ok. Nice touch.

Reasons to Avoid GoDaddy

• Excessive Upselling During Registration
  I don’t even ask my most savvy brand managers to suffer the endless stream of GoDaddy upselling during the registration. My campaigns rarely need the privacy, promotional or hosting add-ons. It can be tricky navigating the registration process, especially by domain owners that aren’t sure about what services are needed.
• Enough with Old Man Perv Thing
  Bob Parsons is a great example of a corporate video blog from a high-profile CEO. It’s a good mix of personality, education and inspiration for domainers.

  However, his boorish persona steeped in adolescence and keenly expressed in the company’s sexually charged Superbowl ads is kinda creepy (he really should consider leaving Guyland). Judging by his fan comments, he has managed to build a cult following a la other web celebs. But is his regression really such a feat in the shadow of Hugh Hefner? I’m just sayin’. Have some fun, but think a little more Richard Branson or Larry Ellison and less Tila Tequila.

In my experience on campaigns large and small, domain management is too often been an afterthought. This is unfortunate because proper domain planning can really help the success of a campaign just as a lack of planning can harm a campaign. Domain stewardship isn’t difficult and it attaches naturally to the creative process.

Online Brand Stewards Should Control Domains

Who is the proper steward of a brand online? The client? The ad agency? The interactive agency? There are many POVs about who “owns” a brand online.

As marketing stretches into corporate strategy, sales, service and support, it becomes more than visual identity and messaging in traditional media. Arguably, some measure of brand ownership actually transfers to the public because of the distributed self-investment of social media.

Online brand stewardship is currently relative to a blend of talent, resources, capabilities, experience and expertise within a particular client-agency partnership. Depending on the mix, brand control would clearly fall into one camp, or it might be a joint responsibility with each party assuming specific roles.

Regardless of who stewards the brand online, one party should assume ownership of the brand’s roster of domains.

Domain Management for Small Businesses

When I started my own web development company in 1997, I used to register domains for my clients. I stopped this practice by 2000 because I found it to be a taxing deviation from my primary service. I spent too much time tracking down old clients, getting renewal approvals and collecting money for domains I paid for, but didn’t own.

I also wasted a lot of time tracking down old web developers and hosting partners who had registered my client’s name in their own name. In most cases, I’d have to convince a dejected former partner to hand me the domain keys. In some cases I encountered old vendors who wouldn’t release the domain without receiving payment on an unrelated service, a form of blackmail domainjacking. Consequently, I registered domains on behalf of my clients using their credit cards.

Today, small hosting companies and web developers can turn to broad suites of automated hosting tools to help them run their business. These tools handle everything from lead gen to automated POS, server administration, and of course, discounted domain registration.

Still, I encounter considerable domain management risk all too frequently. Registration and administration is abdicated to the most technically savvy people on the team.

Good domain management involves more strategy than production. Many domain managers are intimidated by the technicalities of domaining, but they really just need to approve a clear domain strategy. The plan can easily be executed by an interactive producer or brand domainer.

As part of my Domainjacking Primer, I want to share my own experiences in “gettin’ punk’d” by a domainjacker. Hopefully I can help other online brand managers avoid or respond to this kind situation.

The Dastardly Domain Thief

i worked on a national campaign that invested heavily in product development, brand identity and advertising production for months before the official launch. We attracted millions of impressions via PR, TV, radio, direct and online media. Everyone considered the campaign a success.

Unfortunately, within days of launching the campaign, a domain squatter managed to register an odd non-premium generic domain. This person slapped a fake website together to deliberately confuse our target for their own profit. Operating from a foreign country, they sold a knock-off product using our brand equity.

To make matters worse, they launched their own Adwords campaign and directly competed in search media. Our trademarked brand and its keyword variants initially had low usage, so the squatter could snag niche keyword inventory at a very low CPM. However, their “competitive” keyword grab boosted the inventory value, complicated our SEO efforts and made SEM more expensive for our campaign.

By capturing a fraction of our search traffic, they clearly intended to profit from PPC AdSense revenue given the ads plastered throughout their site. In no time flat, we faced public confusion and brand dilution from someone piggybacking our large investment and months of hard work.

Domainjacking Mandates a Swift Response

Fortunately, we responded so quickly that the brand ultimately only suffered mere annoyance. Working through cease and desist letters, we procured the rapid cooperation of the squatter’s registrar and hosting company. We reclaimed rightful domain ownership and even enjoyed brief AdSense exposure at the squatter’s expense.

Following this episode, we developed a comprehensive domain management policy that purchases large blocks of domains. There is now tighter DNS coordination between agency account management and client IT management in the run-up to new campaign launches. And following a campaign launch, the agency and client actively patrol for new infringements against their brands.

Avoid Domainjacking with Proper Planning

In addition to this overt case of domainjacking, I have encountered all kinds of problems from poor domain stewardship. I’ve had to wrest DNS info from former web developers and hosting companies, help track down lost passwords from old employees and rescue domains from botched international transfers. Each of these cases could have been avoided.

These experiences motivated me to write this series on brand stewardship and domainjacking avoidance. Today, I utilize several tools on ad campaigns to help with domain registration, DNS account management, social media profile management as well as engagement analytics.

Speaking of brandjacking, here is the “ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US” vid, a 4-minute mash-up of old viral memes. Lots of mileage from this mix-tape.

Clients, agencies and interactive production shops can use this checklist when registering brands with social networks & web 2.0 platforms for a specific campaign. This list is helpful for domain planning and for domainjacking avoidance.

UsernameCheck.com is a helpful utility that scans social tools to monitor domainjacking. Brand managers may elect to register brands with tools, even if they are not initially used in the campaign. Services like Profilactic.com can help with social media aggregation

» Last Modified December 10, 2008
» # of Platforms 93

Micromedia, Status

Social Bookmarking, Tagging, News, Trends, Lists

Blogging, Self Publication, Mashups, Aggregators

Rich Media, Video/Photo Sharing, Podcast Networks

Social Gaming

Social Communities, Networking

Enterprise, E-commerce, Tools, Utilities

* = High risk for domainjacking. Register these accounts at minimum for all campaigns. Certain types of campaigns may require accounts on other/all platforms.

Was this post helpful? Have any additions? Don’t agree with my taxonomy? I wanna know. Please talk back & leave a comment!