One of the up and coming revolutions in social networking is Twitter. Everyone from grandma tweeting about her breakfast, politicians tweeting about policies and corporations tweeting about their products, twitter is slowly taking the world by storm. Micro blogging is the new way of keeping in touch and letting people know what is happening. An article that I recently came across on Times Online challenges the advantages of twitter for businesses by Sathnam Sanghera.
“Twitter may not be right for business”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/sathnam_sanghera/article6908718.ece
The article argues that tweeting may after all be not good for businesses in the long run. The author makes his stand clear by stating “Why do businesses even bother with Twitter”. The reason the author gives is that tweets from businesses just cannot fit in the standard nature of a tweeter post which is short (140 character limit). Also tweets are real time status updates and have distinct personalities. He believes corporations are slow and require time in coming out with tweets and this does not fit into the real time nature of tweets. Also the level of openness that can be displayed by corporations is limited as compared to you and I and tweeting regularly can lead to a PR nightmare. According to the author tweets are interesting because they reflect the personality of the author and since businesses do not have personality it would never serve the purpose of having an interesting tweet which can be followed. One of the biggest challenges facing businesses and twitter is the feeling of Big Brother watching over you, the sight of “Marks&Spencers” following you would be considered as a privacy intrusion by many. Through these arguments the author clearly shows that there lacks a synergy between tweeting and business purposes. Tweets for businesses like Fords @ScottMonty are successful because it is not Ford talking but an employee of Ford.
The article clearly paints a picture of Twitter being not right for businesses even though statistics and recent developments show that corporations are running towards Twitter. It can be seen that almost 81 Fortune 500 companies own blogs and out of these 21 point towards their twitter accounts. A number of articles and regulations have come up regarding twitter and corporations. In my view companies using Twitter should avoid discussing sensitive information regarding competitors. Twitter has multiple uses in a business context a few of which are listed below.
Direct Marketing
Twitter is now filled with marketing feeds from companies eg. @Marksandspencer (4,428 followers, sample tweet: “Menswear: Pure Wool Single Breasted 2 Button Suit. WAS £199, NOW £149!). This kind of tweet offers a direct marketing channel to reach its consumers and offers a form of direct marketing. In line with the article this form of tweeting is always real time but has no personality, but then again only the followers can see the tweet, and the people following this must have personally subscribed to the tweet.
Tweets are also used to inform the public of new products on offer using new technologies. The advantage of using 140 characters is that those interested can go ahead and search and learn more about the products.
Customer Service
Twitter can be used by corporations to provide quick customer service, e.g JetBlue providing twitter based customer service. This offers a quicker and easier platform for customer service executives and customers to come together to share information quickly.
Corporations Tweeting to Create Goodwill
Large corporations maintain Tweet accounts to help make its operations more transparent, eg. Johnson and Johnson tweeting the status of their Annual General Meeting. This helps create goodwill amongst the shareholders as all the information required is made available pronto in 140 character capsules. Sometimes tweets like these appear as a stream of press releases but then again from my perspective such an initiative also shows the corporation to be more frank and open and hence, would be appreciated by shareholders.
Employees Tweeting
Employee tweets could give positive publicity like “Fords ScottMonty” talking about the interesting things about Ford or negative publicity like the disgruntled employee from Yahoo tweeting about the layoffs. The tweets cannot be controlled and can often lead to PR night mares. Employee tweets are also interesting because like all successful tweets there is a personality behind it.
Other Uses
Tweets can be tracked using external software to search for perceptions about the company or its products. This offers an efficient way for market research and tracking, without going through complex and time intensive consumer surveys and questionnaires.
I thus feel strongly that a social networking phenomenon such as Twitter should not be ignored by corporations. It is forever evolving and the number of users is increasing. Companies need to make sure that the tweets are not monitored so as to avoid creating bad publicity or making an intrusion of privacy by following many people. Twitter should be solely used as a media through which Corporations can pass information along to the people who are interested in it (followers of the feed). Employee tweets cannot be controlled and thus offers a way in which either good PR or bad PR can be created. Disgruntled employees can tweet sensitive information which may create negative PR which then spreads like wildfire. One example of this is the incident of the Yahoo layoffs which lead to the media getting the scoop on what was happening in Yahoo from an insider perspective. With everyone from politicians (Shashi Tharoor – Minister of External Affairs (India) who tweets everything about his work life and his day to day routine) to regular people tweeting about how bad the traffic is on the freeway, I believe corporations should not miss out on this opportunity and utilize it to increase their brand image and become closer to the customer.
http://www.gbltd.com/blog/2009/05/twitter-and-corporations/
http://www.searchenginejournal.com/16-examples-of-huge-brands-using-twitter-for-business/7792/
http://www.businessinsider.com/2008/12/twittering-the-yahoo-layoffs-yhoo
1 comment:
Lots of evidence of Tweeting, but a bit more thought about its implications would be helpful. Shahshi Tharoor is a well-known diplomat and government minister. How does his tweeting affect his role, his effectiveness, and his status? Is this different than a normal bloke tweeting about what he had for lunch? Of course it is, but how/why?
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