In December, megabrand Heinz discovered an impersonator on Twitter: one @hj_heinz. The mystery hijacker had Heinz ketchup bottles for a Twitter background and had been sharing ketchup-related recipes and company tidbits with Heinz lovers in the Twittersphere.

The account had been running for two weeks when Heinz discovered it. Heinz immediately contacted Twitter and had the account stripped (subscription required) of any suggestion the user was associated with the brand.

The next time Michael Werch, the account owner, logged in, he found that his background and bio had been removed and his username had been changed to @NOThj_heinz. No explanation was provided except for a generic message from Twitter saying he'd violated its trademark policy.

Werch, who is an avid Heinz lover, was surprised and upset. He contacted Twitter and offered to work things out with a Heinz representative. He got no response, which was a big mistake.

In February, AdAge.com gave him the opportunity to recount his side of the story—which was then picked up by All Things Digital, BusinessWeek, and countless blogs. Moreover, he revealed to his Twitter followers that he wasn't a Heinz representative, and they encouraged him to continue what he was doing.

The follower count for NOThj_heinz has more than doubled since the incident; people seem to like what he has to share, even if he's not a bona fide Heinz employee.

Here's another story...

Recently, director Kevin Smith, of the Jay and Silent Bob series of films—was kicked off a Southwest Airlines flight for allegedly threatening the safety and comfort of other passengers because of his generous waistline.

Smith made a huge stink on his blog, on his podcast, and on Twitter, arguing that he can safely sit aboard a plane without compromising the comfort or safety of others.

According to Smith, Southwest representative Linda Rutherford called him, conceded that he hadn't been knocked off the flight because of his weight, and seemed willing to do what she could to set the record straight.

Smith was grateful. But in a blog post following their conversation, she never explicitly admits what Smith says she told him: that it wasn't a weight issue. Moreover, after writing the post, Rutherford defends her position, arguing that Southwest interviewed Smith's seatmates.

"Now I'm gonna carry this Too Fat To Fly **** around like herpes for the rest of my life, and it was never even true," Smith lamented on his blog.

Venting into his own literary ether isn't all he's done. He's posted some two dozen YouTube videos and a series of highly detailed podcasts about the Southwest situation.

The stories have two things in common: (1) Repeat customers—the most expensive people for a company to lose—were burned by brands they know and trust, and (2) today, unlike 10 years ago, those customers have a platform for sharing their pain with others.

How the Brands Responded

In the case of Heinz and Michael Werch, nobody's arguing that Heinz should have let Werch—or any other social-media progeny—run buck-wild with its brand. It made a choice that was its right to make: It didn't want a non-brand-related representative speaking for the company. The problem is, Heinz moved too slowly.

According to an official statement from Jessica Jackson, Heinz North America's Group Leader, Public Relations, which was issued when AdAge requested a response, "We actively monitor the social-media space, which is how we discovered the Twitter account 'hj_heinz.' ... Heinz believes in transparency in social media and considered the 'hj_heinz' Twitter account to be very misleading for consumers, especially those people who were following this account. In accordance with Twitter's Terms of Use, Heinz reported the impersonation to Twitter and the account was closed."

Problems with Heinz's response:

If Heinz actively monitors the social-media space, it should've caught Werch much sooner. "As of Dec. 14, I had tweeted 175 times and gained 367 followers from the @HJ_Heinz feed," Werch writes in AdAge. That might not sound like a lot, but Werch knows better: "For two weeks I spoke unrestricted as the company. This in its own right is a potential PR nightmare."

Jackson says Werch's failure to disclose that he wasn't a Heinz employee was misleading for consumers. But Werch professes himself "genuinely enthusiastic" about Heinz, which is why he chose to impersonate it. He conducted serious research to make himself sound like a credible source for the brand.

It doesn't appear, however, that Heinz took any time to research him or get the feel of the "hj_heinz" personality; in the end, Heinz burned an enthusiast and, in so doing, conveyed the message to his followers that that's how the company treats such people—frostily and without discrimination.

The Jackson statement is clinical and reeks of a lawyer's vetting. It sits in Werch's AdAge column, below the account of a relatable and intelligent brand evangelist who was ignored when he tried to make right.

Southwest wronged Smith by unnecessarily embarrassing him in a public situation and being vague about why he was removed from the flight in the first place.

The PR nightmare was well on its way to resolution when company representative Linda Rutherford called him to make right; the problem is that she apparently divulged to Smith by phone that he was not ejected from the plane for being too fat to fly yet in her blog post following their conversation continues to allude that that was indeed the reason.

After reading the post, a betrayed Smith opines:

"When we spoke, you told me they were wrong, and THAT'S why I was happy and ready to drop all this. I don't want your money, I just want you to put in print what you told me: that I was grabbed because I was the last guy on, not because I didn't fit with the arm rests down, or because I couldn't buckle the seat belt. Because I did. And we both know this."

After the publication of her apology, Rutherford justifies her change in position by asserting, "The people around you said they had to lean over to make room for you."

In response to that, which he suspects to be a lie, Smith actually hunts down one of his Southwest seatmates and interviews her on Episode 107 of Smodcast, his personal podcast.