My most embarrassing day as a Social Media Manager was a fine lovely day in 2015, the Nigerian political space was hot as the country was preparing a historical election that would forever change the political landscape.
The Twitter streets were divided into 3 parts;
1. You were either supporting the incumbent for reelection
2. Or supporting the opposition candidate
3. Or a fenciest who is neither supporting or opposing any of the major candidates publicly but tweets in parables about their preferred candidate
It was my second year as s digital media manager where I worked at the time and one of my core responsibilities was the managing incoming and outgoing online interactions for the company so I always had the company’s social media assets logged in on my phone.
As a matter of discipline too, I was only online on my personal social media accounts on the bus to and fro work. I also mainly tweeted my political views in the evenings on my way home, I was very vocal about my support for my preferred presidential candidate so it wasn’t that of a big deal
Also Read: My Six (6) Speaking Engagements Of 2019
So this fateful Wednesday, I was on my way to Church from work and was tweeting about why the candidate I was supporting was the best choice and should be voted for, I shared almost 15 tweets and I l felt so good doing so because supporting your candidate was a means of SURVIVAL on twitter, you wanted to convince your followers (who are probably not listening and are also trying to convince other people) to support your candidate and why he was the best, even though I wasn’t being paid, I felt it was a patriotic thing to do as a Nigerian, LOL.
I turned off the internet data on my phone to avoid any form of distraction during the church service, you know how it feels right? Tweeting your hearts out for the candidate you support then heading to church to sing your lungs out for the God you worship.
While I was in church I had this urge to turn on my data and logon to twitter to check my phone/ mails after the powerful worship session and a good time of lifting up Holy Hands about 30 minutes after turning off my data.
Ladies and gentlemen, I shared those tweets from my organization’s Twitter handle, FUNKEEE. Aye mi te mi ba mi (Only NIGERIANS will understand this expression, just Google it!). I had shared the tweets on my organization’s account and my boss was already receiving emails, calls, chats and he had also sent me and text messages asking questions.
Click HERE to subscribe to my YouTube channel and watch exciting and insightful videos videos
That was the embarrassing day of my professional career yet, I felt really bad, I could have paid more attention to details, I could have crosschecked, I could have been more patient. Well, the tweets were eventually deleted and I was extremely lucky to have my job, thanks to my awesome supervisor and boss.
The ultimate lesson was learned, NEVER HAVE YOUR CLIENT OR ORGANISATION’S SOCIAL MEDIA HANDLES PERMANENTLY SIGNED INTO YOUR DEVICES, ESPECIALLY MOBILE.
Have you had a similar experience or worse managing a social media account for your organization or client? Do share.