During the pandemic, people have been flooded with misinformation, making it difficult to discern fact from fiction. Thankfully though, there has been an unexpected source of wisdom and critical thought: The Twitter account of a frozen meat company. 

Yes, you heard that right - a frozen sliced beef company! 

How did that happen? 

Enter Steak-Umm. In April 2020, they took on the challenge of misinformation as a creative approach to their social media strategy. The timing was noteworthy - misleading information, poor source quality, and low standards of evidence is especially harmful during the uncertainty and anxiety of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

So in response to this, Steak-Umm’s content shifted dramatically. Instead of posting about their frozen sliced beef products, they started posting tweets like this:  

“Friendly reminder in times of uncertainty and misinformation: anecdotes are not data. (good) data is carefully measured and collected information based on a range of subject-dependent factors, including, but not limited to, con- trolled variables, meta-analysis, and randomization” 

This one tweet, which is pinned to the top of their account, has 19.3K retweets and 73.6K likes. 

Steak-Umm did not stop at data collection, analysis, and presentation. Another Steak-Umm Twitter thread discussed conspiracy theories. They stated: 

“conspiracy theories are baked into human nature, they don’t only affect the fringes. all people naturally seek patterns to make sense of the world’s randomness and develop in-group, out-group prejudices that make them vulnerable to all kinds of propaganda, paranoia, and extremism” 

Following this conspiracy theory tweet, Steak-Umm continued to support their claim with research, explanations, and how conspiracy theories should be controlled. This specific tweet had 1.4K retweets and 5.7K likes and the rest of the thread had many impressions as well. 

Steak-Umms provided tweet thread after tweet thread with advice, guidance, and admonishments. In just a few weeks, they quickly became Twitter’s most surprising epistemological beacon. And in this same short amount of time, they increased their follower count by over 60K. 

Why was Steak-Umms’ content game so effective? 

Researchers Ekaterina Bogomoletc of North Carolina State University and Nicole M. Lee of Arizona State University explores how Steak-Umm’s media adjustment was successful through an expectancy violation theory lens. The expectancy violation theory predicts consumer response to unexpected communication. This study focuses on positive expectancy violations: positive consumer behavior in response to unexpected communication.  

In this edition of Consumer Behavior Insights, we explore Steak-Umm’s successful social media strategy using Bogomoletc and Lee’s study as a base.

Methodology of the Study on Twitter Misinformation During the Pandemic

To analyze consumer reactions to the company’s social media strategy change, the researchers analyzed 1,000 random tweets that replied to or mentioned Steak-Umm, similar to Tatiana Prowell’s. They used a five-step process from Smith (1995) to indicate the most prominent themes within these tweets. This is a structured, qualitative analysis pioneered through text-based conversations and designed to identify the most consistent patterns and themes.

The Results and Implications of Steak-Umm’s Brand Communication in the Pandemic on Consumer Behavior 

Four themes rose from the analysis: praise, leadership, surprise, and product mentions. Consumers praised Steak-Umm through tweets thanking them for being an educational source on misinformation during the pandemic. The second theme was leadership, in which many people compared Steak-Umm to then President Trump and Vice President Biden. They joked how the writer of these tweets should run for president! 

Surprise, the third theme, that this frozen meat company has become an information hub also appeared in replies and mentions. It was often stated that this was an example of the continuation of weird events that have occurred in 2020. For example, a verified oncologist with 25K followers quoted Steak-Umm’s pinned tweet saying, “As a vegetarian since 1986, couldn’t have predicted I’d ever RT @steak_umm, but this #COVID19 #pandemic is full of surprises. I am here for this pro-science #publichealth content”(Tatiana Prowell, 2020). It is clear that a food business posting political information shocked many, but it had a positive response from the public and well-known twitter accounts.   

The last theme found in the five-step analysis was product mentions. Consumers stated that they were going to go out and buy Steak-Umm to thank them for their actions. All of these positive themes support the researcher’s belief that positive expectancy violations occurred.

The researchers produced three main implications for strategic and technical communicators from this study. The first is that companies should be comfortable surprising their audience and showing their human side, just like Steak-Umm. The second is that companies must have a set of values that they follow that are consistent throughout their social media. Lastly, brand communication has a role in social change. Steak-Umm is a strong example that any company can become a leader in sparking social change that many companies should emulate. 

So next time you’re looking for information, remember that this frozen beef slice company is a good place to start. 

Your Pop Neuro Consumer Behavior Insights

• The expectancy violation theory predicts consumer’s response to unexpected communication, such as Steak-Umm’s social change tweets 

• Positive expectancy violations, the positive outcome from unexpected communication is thought to be the cause of Steak-Umm’s significant increase in following on Twitter 

• Steak-Umm received responses categorized as praise, leadership, surprise, and product mention 

• Companies should not be afraid to step out of their comfort zone and speak up about social issues- it ended up being an incredibly successful marketing strategy for Steak-Umm! 

• Companies should have values that they follow, especially in their social media 

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References

Bogomoletc, E., & Lee, N. M. (2020). Frozen Meat Against COVID-19 Misinformation: An Analysis of Steak-Umm and Positive Expectancy Violations. Journal of Business and Technical Communication, 105065192095918. https://doi.org/10.1177/1050651920959187

Smith, J. (1995). Semi-structured interviewing and qualitative analysis. In J. Smith, R. Harre & L. Langenhove (Eds.), Rethinking methods in psychology (pp. 9–26). Sage. 

Steak-umm on Twitter. (n.d.). Twitter. Retrieved October 6, 2020, from https://twitter.com/steak_umm/status/1304476424259219456

Tatiana Prowell, MD on Twitter. (n.d.). Twitter. Retrieved October 6, 2020, from https://twitter.com/tmprowell/status/1281746800723079169