First of all, let’s recap: Earlier today, Greg Heaslip, a security guard at the Arcadia group, sent an innocuous holiday request. To the entire company:

https://assets.econsultancy.com/images/resized/0004/8323/greg_3-blog-full.png

We’ve all accidentally hit ‘reply all’ in the past, but Greg’s effort was destined for far more than a few laughs in the office.

Thanks to Twitter, #GiveGregTheHoliday has been out-trending the EU elections all morning.

At Econsultancy we vaguely pride ourselves on our social media agility, and frankly being crammed in a small corner does occasionally lead Team Content to flights of fancy.

Earlier, our Deputy Ed, David Moth, spotted the hashtag and replied to it on Twitter.

The rest of us joined in, and, realising that our London offices sit opposite Arcadia, saw the chance for a bit of pointless fun on Twitter – cue our support for the #GiveGregTheHoliday:

A few dozen ReTweets later and I’m beginning to feel like I can take the afternoon off, my engagement quotient fulfilled, but the story kept growing, with a range of brands leaping on board.

Firstly, all kudos should go to Trek America. Deciding that this was in line with the brand’s ‘spirit of adventure’, it quickly made the decision to offer Greg a free adventure holiday in the US, flights included:

Ours was an example of a brand being vaguely silly, but hopefully lets people know that yes, actual humans work at Econsultancy, and we enjoy chatting on Twitter to no particular end.

Trek America’s was far more impressive (and generous, although frankly we aren’t sure if Greg would benefit from a subscription package).

In the wake of their offer, other brands were quick to join in. TopMan, Miss Selfridge, BHS, Burton Menswear and more all offered free additions to help Greg enjoy his trip:

So far, so good. All these items tied in nicely with the trend and conversation. They showed that people working at these brands were watching Twitter, and were able to make quick decisions. “Can we give someone a free gift right now?” Is an easy question, but getting a straight answer is often difficult. Speed is absolutely of the essence.

Then came the follow-up tweets. Thomas Cook asked if anyone would like to Join Greg in Nevada, but their tweet only included a link to a landing page offering Vegas Holidays.

Yes it’s connected, but it isn’t really in the right spirit, so could come off as a little crass here. And then things started to get weirder.

By this point, there’s no connection other than: “Shit, something is trending, get on it!”

There’s no consideration about whether it has any relevance to the conversation, so it falls totally flat. We’re aware that our product has nothing at all to do with this, which is why we aren’t firing out tweets mentioning our Real-Time Platform Buyer’s Guide in connection with this.

Agility isn’t always about selling,. It’s about showing that you’re aware, that you are real people with a sense of fun. There’s an old adage about people buying from people, not brands, and never is that truer than on Twitter.

Incidentally: Greg, if you’re reading this, we recommend you put it all on red.