In the evolving world of social media, it’s the wild fliers you have to look for, you know. That solid homerun with the unintended consequences. Like a blogger relations strategy that goes hinky. Or a word of mouth campaign that slowly builds up some substantial and negative street-level karma.

It’s like going to a baseball game with the gang from work and witnessing a homerun derby – then discovering that one of the homeruns went through the windshield of the boss’ Escalade.

What’s the point of selling the management team on a new and innovative strategy if you don’t outline some of the risks that may accompany it? A capable counsellor always tempers their pie-in-the-sky projections with a dose of reality. For example: our blogger relations program could help influence online opinion of our new program – or it could really irritate one particularly influential commentator.

Preparing the groundwork before launching your new communications strategy will insulate it from unintended consequences.

Some ways a social media strategy can go hinky:

• You target bloggers with an unrelated interest or specialty, and they write about it
• Your new campaign comes with eau de toilette: the specialists you hired have screwed up so many campaigns in the past their work is automatically discounted
• Over-hyping your innovative new outreach strategy to the traditional media alienates social media and online outlets
• Hip to be square: trying to look edgy and innovative never sells as well as you’d imagined
• The bloggers you target aren’t transparent about their relationship, but the blame blows back on your company
• That new car smell: the executives get so excited about trying something new that they overlook the poor fit with actual business strategy. They later abandon the project without support
• One of your executives tries to influence the company’s Wikipedia page
• Your street team hires a: felon/female impersonator/ladie’s man

How to prepare for potential risks:

• Make sure the pitch for the business includes a dose of reality
• The social media evangelist should be accompanied by a strategist who can draw the whole media picture. A sober second voice, if you will. Maybe even a planner…
• Follow up on that dose of reality: schedule a discussion of how past social media campaigns have rolled out – including the unmitigated disasters
• The strategy should dentify how to respond to possible complications/crises. This will force everyone involved to work through responsibilities and roles before the crunch comes.
• The customer relations team/call centre HAS to be briefed on the strategy: they’ll be the first to hear of any problems

Any other suggestions?