HMV yesterday learned first-hand the dangers to a business of ignoring the importance of social media. As the company geared up to dismiss 60 staff, a “rogue” employee live-tweeted the unfolding bloodbath from HMV’s official Twitter account. The eyewitness reports of loyal staff being sacked rapidly became a worldwide, trending topic, with the high point of the gallows humour being a tweet that read: “Just heard our marketing director (he’s staying, folks) ask “How do I shut down Twitter?”"

It later emerged from the Mail that the employee responsible for the leak was Poppy Rose Cleere – HMV’s online marketing and social media planner. She later took to Twitter via her own account to lament the lack of respect and attention that social media had received at the stricken retailer, stating: “I worked tirelessly to educate the business of the importance of Social Media – not as a short-term commercial tool, but as a tool to build and strengthen the customer relationship, and to gain invaluable real-time feedback … while many colleagues understood and supported this, it was the more senior members of staff who never seemed to grasp its importance”.

With this demonstration of just how powerful social media can be, Cleere has certainly ensured that management will sit up and take notice. She has perhaps also highlighted the problems that the company has faced in general, with an out-of-touch upper management failing to adapt to a changing, digital world. Short-term fixes, such as imposing a staff-wide ban on exposed body art, led only to ridicule and PR embarrassment.

The incident also serves as a dual warning: to those employing social media simply because of its voguish status, it demonstrates that its value can be negative as well as positive if not carefully monitored. And secondly, administrators would be advised to ensure all avenues of dissent are closed before breaking the bad news. The leak – and the failures it has revealed – could well be harmful to the company’s prospects of being saved.