We all manage different types of communities and each has a range of goals. But at the core, our goals as community managers are obviously to manage the community, correct errors and reward super-fans as we see fit.

Some of us work directly with the team behind the product, while others, like myself, are at an agency and thus work outside of the built-in marketing/public relations/IT teams. There are pluses and minuses to both, but rewarding fans, both for positive contributions and for their frustrations is a part of many of our jobs. So, what happens when it fails?

Fortunately for me, I had not had to encounter this phenomenon until recently. There are three types of what I am going to call “Surprise & Delight.

1. Rewarding fans organically, one at a time. This can be for a number of reasons, but maybe they are super-fans and you have a new product, they haven’t been able to try your product or perhaps they just interact with you a lot and a reward is deserved.
2. You may also do things like Facebook Tabs where people input their address information and they get something. I recently participated in one of those with Burburry. It worked fine and I have already received my free product.
3. The other surprise you can offer your communities is the public giveaway outside of a Facebook tab. It is typically much smaller in scale than the tab where you have a new product to have people try.

What happens when things don’t go well?

Bad things, that’s what. If you haven’t worked on a CPG brand before, there is a community of people out there who subscribe to each and every “freebie and coupon site on the planet. Without being insensitive, many of these “fans only seek out free samples. That is their goal, and they do believe they are entitled to them.

When this happens, when the tab breaks, or when your site crashes, or when your limited supply is exhausted so fast that the freebie crowd demands they receive something too; what to do?

Be honest about what has happened. If this is on Facebook, respond to everything and announce you are out of product. Inform the fans that the site had complications because of their passion. Tell them that you are working on the issue.

Just like any public relations disaster we see and read about today, being up front right from the start only builds good-will.

The key to running an effective surprise and delight program is to be transparent, to test everything as much as you can and in the end, be open about the process. And live by the trite but true motto of under-promise and over-deliver.

Richard Dedor

Richard Dedor is a writer, speaker, coach and social media consultant. He ran for office at age 18 and has written one book, Anything is Possible. You can find him at his blog, Believe in Possible and on Twitter @RichardDedor.