Corned beef sandwiches may not be the first thing you think of when you think of social media, but Manny's Deli in Chicago is an excellent example of a company that leverages it well. I’ve chosen Manny’s for this post because 1) it is not Frito Lay, Dr. Pepper, etc, i.e. companies that you would normally expect to take advantage of social media; and 2) Manny’s makes the best corned beef sandwich in the world. This is not up for debate. I’m not going to attempt to describe what it’s like to eat a Manny’s corned beef sandwich because I lack the vocabulary of a food savant, but below are some pictures of people that you might know that think it’s great.
Ted Allen, from the Food Network, on the show the Best Thing I’ve Ever Ate. Ok, so I couldn’t find a picture of Ted Allen eating there, but he was on the show talking about it. This is Manny's blog post about it.
President of the United States, Barack Obama
Close-up view of the sandwich
Before I continue, I think it is important to describe what the Manny’s environment is like. Manny’s has been around since 1942 and is simply a no frills, pseudo-Kosher cafeteria with ample seating. Everyone eats at Manny’s. Chicago businesspeople and politicians, tour buses full of grandmas and grandpas, broke college students in ratty jeans, and US presidents. When you go through the cafeteria line you always get greeted by this charismatic gentleman whose name escapes me at the moment. He’s the one slicing your corned beef and he has a quirky way of treating people. Senior citizens get the utmost respect and attention from him, good looking ladies bring out the flirt in him, and the young college guys (like I was back then), well you get a little insult: “What are you punks doing here again?,” or “Go get yourself a haircut.” I know, not really endearing to most, but to a young college guy, it makes a little bit of sense. It was like my dad yelling at me, who I missed, but he was 1100 miles away in Houston.
The reason I relate all this information to you is that the Manny’s experience, in addition to serving an amazing corned beef sandwich, is all about relationships. Despite the hundreds of customers they get throughout the day, the staff there want to treat you as if you were family. I believe that Manny’s Facebook page is an excellent vehicle for them to extend these relationships outside of the cafeteria. Although Manny’s management probably didn’t read Groundswell and probably just thought of Facebook as some technology they should be on because everyone is on it, they inadvertently stumbled upon a relationship building gold mine with their Facebook page. Below are some examples about what I’m talking about.
In general, most of the postings on the Manny’s page are in this vein. This has a powerful effect on the people that area already loyal to Manny’s, but can you imagine the curiosity it would spark in people that may have stumbled upon the page through a friend’s page?
I think what’s incredible about this page is that Manny’s isn’t really doing anything to curate the page other than posting the occasional event or celebrity guest visiting the cafeteria. Groundswell speaks about the potentially adverse effects of a tool like Facebook. Tons of people are on it all the time with the potential to post negative things on it. However, you don’t see anything negative on the Manny’s page. It’s a testament to the fact that social media is a tool to help augment relationships, not replace them. The reason you don’t see anyone trashing Manny’s on their Facebook page is because they take of their customer where it matters – at the cafeteria.
Overall, I think social media tools like Facebook are something that can be utilized effectively by local businesses, more so than Frito Lay’s and Dr. Pepper’s of the world. Local businesses tend to be relationship-based and thus a relationship-type technology is going to help them. I don’t personally know the CEO of PepsiCo and eating a bag of Cheetos doesn’t make me think of home. But I do get that marketers understand that they need to establish a personal relationship with their customers and I think some of the wiser ones get the relationship-based nature of the technologies and their potential. Can they replicate the type of feelings when I go to Manny’s though? I don’t know. It hasn’t happened for me yet.
Juan- you did make Manny's come to life! You touched on a very important point- that any kind of media is not worth much if the core product offering has flaws. The service that you speak of is reflected in the overwhelmingly positive response in the company's facebook page.
ReplyDeleteIt would be interesting to see if more active participation on the management's part could have helped take it further.