It has been interesting to watch the debate and analysis of the Motrin Mommy Blogger event. I was lucky enough to watch from it’s formative stages and develop a simple opinion that I have not seen voiced. Whether Motrin deserved the criticism or not, is not the point. Motrin should be thanking the mom bloggers. Yes, ‘thank you or paying attention and providing your feedback’.

Motrin had a well-intended concept, but execution was poor and understandably can be found offensive by mothers. Mom-bloggers told them so in no uncertain terms. The difference here, from what has happened to offensive marketing messages in the past, is that the event was public, was collaborated upon, and spread rapidly. Motrin was embarrassed and retreated rapidly.

Back to my point about ‘thanking’ the mom-bloggers. Motrin responded by pulling the ads and canceling several planned media expenditures which could have potentially offended hundreds of thousands of more mothers! This could have been much worse and in a world without twitter and blogs, they would have never known. A large amount of budget and brand value was saved.

Now Motrin is part of the social media conversation. They weren’t before, and now have the opportunity for a do-over. I’ll bet it goes much better next time. Surely, they have learned a great deal, as we all have. Thank you mom-bloggers.