Marketing Trends

A Twitter campaign that was supposed to reveal positive stories from McDonald’s suppliers turned into a nasty hashtag hijacking, as unhappy customers tweeted a variety of unpleasant tales — such as finding fingernails in their food.
The hashtag #McDStories started last week with a few tweets from the brand, promoting tales from suppliers. “Meet some of the hard-working people dedicated to providing McDs with quality food every day #McDStorieshttp://t.co/BoNIwRJS,” one of the tweets...

Bill Gates reflects on the death of his longtime friend and rival Steve Jobs in an upcoming interview with Nightline’s Bill Weir.
“You gotta pick important stuff because you only have a limited amount of time,” Gates says, reflecting on Jobs’ passing, mortality and his own philanthropic goals in a segment posted to Yahoo....

With the Super Bowl less than two weeks away, advertisers are following one of two plays: Remain completely mum about what they’re going to do, or attempt to maximize that $3.5 million ad spend with teaser videos on YouTube.
Actually, there’s a third option as well: Run a contest with consumer-generated ads and them put those on YouTube. Usually, Doritos (or a PepsiCo sibling) is the only brand to go the crowdsourced route, but this year Chevrolet is running a similar contest...

We all (hopefully) learn from our mistakes. Entrepreneurs, especially, are bound to make them -- and it's those early stumbles that can make (or break) them.
Of course, it's always better to learn from other people's mistakes. The business world is full of blunders, and watching them can be great sport. As 2011 drew to a close, we saw obituaries for ill-conceived gadgets like the TouchPad, HP's attempted...