Tweet for Customer Care!

Twitter has been a favourite topic of discussion among bloggers for the past few months. And as in my blog I am trying to describe various tools of e-marketing, this one definitely deserves attention. Obviously, Twitter can be of good use in market research and advertising. But apart from that, it can be used to respond to customer service issues. A lot of companies are on Twitter already, actively monitoring it. The methods of tweet tracking include, for example, TweetScan, TweetVolume, Terraminds Search, Quotably – and this is not the full list. If you are willing to improve your customer service, it’s quite simple to track problems your customers experience with your product and respond to them.

The most notable and discussed examples of companies already using Twitter are Dell and Comcast. Dell follows the Twitter conversations using Tweetscan and reacts when customers ask questions or complain about the Dell products or services. Both these companies had problems with their online reputation previously, and are trying to do everything to prevent it from happening again. Among other companies that have their representatives on Twitter are Firefox, Microsoft, Yahoo, Disney, SAP Labs, and a few airline companies. Most of them, as it is not very hard to notice, belong to the computer segment. Obviously, getting advice on Twitter will be of more help if you have a problem installing software, than if your microwave oven’s broken. Still, other companies could benefit from it as well. Such instant interaction gives customers a sense that companies are open and really care. So I think it is only a matter of time that more and more brands will be using it – if not for the customers’ sake, then for the sake of their reputation.

Twitter gives an opportunity to build an actual relationship with each particular complaining individual. It provides (great?) opportunities for building company’s reputation and enhancing the brand. And yet, the more companies use various kinds of social media, the less privacy customers have.

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