Fine Print

BusinessWeek had a story last Saturday about how companies are using Twitter to monitor themselves online, find out who is tweeting about them, and then jumping into the conversation to address those (usually negative) issues. “Is this a creepy trend?” asks the article.

No! Is my resounding answer. It’s about time companies started listening to their customers for a change instead of selling to them. The ROI will come in time; people like to be respected.

The story mentions Jonathan Fields’ experience of spotting William Shatner waiting to board a JetBlue flight. Fields wrote about it on Twitter, and within 10 seconds (I find that part hard to believe, it’s an ultra-fast response!) was being “followed” by JetBlue.

[cut] “It totally startled me,” says the 42-year-old author, who initially worried that JetBlue might be monitoring his use of the Wi-Fi connection. JetBlue employee Morgan Johnston quickly explained that wasn’t the case. JetBlue keeps tabs on what Twitter users say about it, using a scanning tool, to find customers who might need information, say, on flight delays or cancellations, Johnston said. [paste]

If users of these microblogging services realise that anything they put out there is in the public domain, searchable and fair game for comment, then the element of being surprised — if a company or person chooses to pick it up and run with it, or follow them, or link to them, or lambast them, or refer them to others — … on and on … — is totally gone.

In fact, these days, if someone doesn’t react to what you’ve said, then, that is surprising. It’s turning 180 and customers better get used to it and get excited by it.

[Hat tip for the lead to Laura Fitton.]

So, if you’re now prepared and comfortable with being “followed,” you better learn about personal branding. This could be the best 15 pages you’ll read today on that front.

~ John Carson, Senior Digital Media Specialist, GCI Canada