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Uh Oh Dominos

So what happens when you are the largest pizza chain in the world and two employees decide to stick dough in their pants and serve it?  Well before YouTube, a few adolescents had a good laugh and an unsuspecting customer had a “spicy” pizza.  Now in the age of YouTube, why not put it on air?  That’s just what happened to Domino's Pizza last week forcing a glum CEO to make an embarrassing apology.

Online research outfit MediaCurves.com found that, “65% of respondents who would previously visit or order Domino’s Pizza, were less likely to do so after viewing a ‘prank’ video, which was posted on YouTube earlier this week.”  Take a look at Domino's President Patrick Doyle apologizing an you will see the ugly results.

What could Dominos have done to prevent their plunge in credibility?  Well, I’m not here to tell the world that AirCheese is the panacea for teenage idiots, but it could have told Domino's a lot very quickly.

Almost after the video was released its references on the internet were surging through the roof in only a few hours.  AirCheese would have immediately alerted Domino's of the level of bad references as well as where they are all pointing to: the prank video.  Within minutes (instead of days), damage control could have been put into place, curbing any further damage… hopefully before it made the nightly news.

There will be plenty more of these examples to come for sure, but it must make you think.  When is it time that you started monitoring the BUZZ about your brand?