Subscribe & Follow

Advertise your job vacancies

Jobs

Head of Performance Marketing South Africa
LinkedIn Outreach Assistant - Remote Cape Town
Creative Content Video Editor Johannesburg
Influencer Campaign Manager Cape Town
Pioneering Coordinator Cape Town
Social Media Manager Cape Town
Video Editor for Social Media Content Cape Town
Social Media Manager and Strategist Cape Town
Junior Digital Art and Social Media Marketing Coordinator Johannesburg
Multi Media Journalist | South Coast Sun Durban

Hershel Jawitz on #PennySparrow debacle

4 Jan 2016

[Newswatch] It hasn't been a good start to the year for Jawitz Properties, as their brand reputation was tarnished due to former employee, Penny Sparrow's offensive statement on the KZN beaches on New Year's Day.

click to enlarge

Her post on Facebook quickly went viral and had the nation up in arms, with many saying they would never deal with Jawitz Properties in the future.

According to Hershel Jawitz, CEO of Jawitz Properties in an interview with Gushwell Brooks on Cape Talk last night, Penny Sparrow hasn't been an employee of the company since November last year, but she hasn't removed her title from Facebook, hence the current association with the property firm.

Jawitz said "she is not an employee of our brand" and "we will not tolerate these views and action will be taken to have this sorted out."

Social media crisis management played a big role for many companies in 2015, and it seems like 2016 will be no different.

As Tiffany Markman states "It's only when morons who don't understand how social media works put offensive things on the Internet (because they think Facebook is private) and get publicly shamed, that the employer brand thinks, 'Yikes. How do I distance my company, quickly, from this catastrophe?'"

Listen to the full interview via Soundcloud below: