CRM in the Twitterverse and YouTube World

I’ve said it before – beware the 19th Century corporation operating in a 21st Century World. Most companies still don’t get it. Most think blogging and social networks and especially Twitter, are for kids or losers.

But as a Twit (?), albeit with training wheels, I am delighted by the access to information and views and thoughts I had no way of finding previously without incredibly tedious research, and perhaps no way at all. It is the great repository in the sky of “unknown unknowns”. Find me at www.twitter.com/repreport.

Granted, there are companies using social media for viral advertising campaigns. Few are using it well, and fewer still truly understand the power and value of the genuine engagement this new channel delivers. Remember, dissemination is out, engagement in.

But you’d be hard pressed to find a better example of being with it, and truly “getting it” than this.

Jessica Gottlieb, an LA mum (and now famous Mommy Blogger) in New York with her family, put her kids on a plane to return to LA by themselves ahead of their parents. She sat at the gate while the kids remained on the plane on the tarmac through a 2.5 hour delay. She wasn’t happy, but initially, she was worried. Unable to get information from the gate staff as to what the problem was, she went online via her phone, sending this “tweet” to her 9,000+ followers on Twitter:

Dear Virgin Air my children have been on the tarmac for one hour with 90 more minutes to wait. I am at JFK gate b25. Pls RT.

She asked her followers to re-tweet her post and they dutifully did. Within minutes, Virgin phoned the gate, asked for Gottlieb, explained to her the delay and reassured her that her kids were fine. This information too, made its way to the Twitterverse.

Now that’s a company “monitoring the buzz” about their company online and in real time. Better still, they were proactive in resolving a customer complaint. Response matters. You get a gold star Virgin.

Not like United Airlines.

Dave Carroll, bass player of the Sons of Maxwell, tells an all too familiar story that could actually be told about a number of companies. This one is about United Airlines. The company treated Dave so badly, his only recourse was to do what he did. He blogged. But more than that, he wrote a song and uploaded it to YouTube. It’s worth a visit. Last I checked, it had received 218,000 views.

If you don’t think word of mouth matters anymore because of the Internet – you need a slap. It not only matters more, it is the single most important factor in your brand management, customer relationships, and reputational risk.

The short form of Dave’s story as he tells it:

In the spring of 2008, Sons of Maxwell were traveling to Nebraska for a one-week tour and my Taylor guitar was witnessed being thrown by United Airlines baggage handlers in Chicago. I discovered later that the $3,500 guitar was severely damaged. They didn’t deny the experience occurred but for nine months the various people I communicated with put the responsibility for dealing with the damage on everyone other than themselves and finally said they would do nothing to compensate me for my loss. So I promised the last person to finally say “no” to compensation (Ms. Irlweg) that I would write and produce three songs about my experience with United Airlines and make videos for each to be viewed online by anyone in the world. United: Song 1 is the first of those songs. United: Song 2 has been written and video production is underway. United: Song 3 is coming. I promise.

See the detailed story here.

Now for those who question how many people read Dave’s blog – (I mean really, Canadian country music band)- what are the the odds? The beauty of the Internet as social media channel today is that it is on Dave’s blog, it is on his Myspace and Facebook pages, it has been picked up by Internet news services, picked up by other blogs (like this) and Tweeted on Twitter. Anyone good at maths out there who can tell me what the stats are for the exponential impact of that kind of exposure?

Great song Dave! Can you write one about Volvo for me?

So, two examples of customers using social media (Twitter and YouTube) to complain, with just one example of a company getting it and working it to best advantage.

I wonder, as a consumer, would this change your choice of airline?

As a business owner, CEO or manager, would it change the way you do things in your company?

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Tags: dave carroll, mommy blogger, Twitter, United Airlines, Virgin Airlines, YouTube

Category: Internet as Media, Reputation Management