For those of you that are unlucky to follow me on Twitter/Facebook/Loopt you probably get a dose of my praises and rants for the brands that I interact with. For example, when I first got my iPhone some of my friends went to buy one because they read all my comments. But I have also been commenting on the bad like when my mobile phone carrier continues to amaze me with their inane policies. These of course aren’t the only brands that anyone or I talk about but most of the time I feel that our comments don’t always get addressed. Twitter is an easy way for companies to stay involved in conversations and people like Joseph Jaffe have been commenting on this for a while.
I was extremely delighted when I got the above reply from Firefox yesterday. I had viewing problems with my Gmail on Firefox 3 and thought about possibly switching back to Safari. Instead I got a nice reply from Firefox, which corrected the problem. Needless to say when I started my browser today it was Firefox and not Safari. Something so simple yet made me feel like such an appreciated customer even though Firefox’s product is free. So I ask, if they can do it, why can’t other brands as well?
St.John Oneil-Dunne
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Twitter is an interesting case that hasn’t been fully understood by a LOT of brands. It’s the new Facebook of 2008 as far as brands wanting to jump onto something they don’t comprehend. The sad thing is that I don’t feel like brands are even grasping the concept of the technologies they’ve left in the hype dust (MySpace, Facebook, Second Life), before jumping to the next thing.
But of all of the brands currently on twitter:
http://blog.fluentsimplicity.com/twitter-brand-index/
There are a few that get that it isn’t just another way to push your RSS feed, that it is a more instantaneous way to reach out to your customers than ever before…
Southwest Airlines answers customer questions about ticket prices and flight delays, Whole Foods Market posts details about discounts, and Comcast reaches out to complaining customers with the @comcastcares.
No need for Zappos to get all the attention, there are some other interesting case studies out there. Then of course, there are starting to be some cases of brandjacking too, like in the case of Exxon:
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/tech/news/5920836.html
I had the same experience. Twittered about FF3 and Gmail, and received a response from FF almost right away. Good job Firefox. So far all my bitching about the other browser has gone unanswerred.