Even though I understood the power of Twitter for marketing, I have managed to stay away from Twitter for much longer than I had Facebook. About a month ago I gave in and signed up for my Twitter account and fortunately managed to get my full name which was pleasing.
It took a while for me to get my head around using @ and D + username + message (direct messaging), but I was amazed how quickly I could follow people of interest and found a whole new selection of blogs, material and have made some great contacts on there.
Last week I was attending a music festival abroad as to which I had not received my ticket for. I would admit I did leave it till the last minute to chase for my ticket, but I thought that I would be able to login to my account and resend ticket – this was not the case. I found the call centre number from the website. I rang the number where I was transferred overseas.
I spent 20 minutes explaining why I had not got my ticket and requested they emailed it over which they could not do. I was advised to send an email a specific department which I did – 2 hours later no response.
I decided to be sneaky and call head office where I was transferred overseas again and this time I was advised to make the email “important” in the header and mark “urgent” in the subject line – 3 hours later no response.
Getting rather annoyed and desperate for my ticket I ranted my anger on Twitter using the companies name as a hash tag. At around the same time I received a an email requesting I complete a customer satisfaction survey to a query that had not been resolved, so once I again I headed to Twitter and voiced my opinion on there.
Within 3 minutes of my second moan on Twitter I received a phone call from the companies head office in the UK, who apologised, emailed my ticket whilst on the phone to them and the issue which had taken over 5 hours, 2 phone calls and 2 emails had been resolved using the power of Twitter.
Obviously companies (like us) actively monitor online reputation, but I was extremely surprised at how quickly the company reacted and full credit for doing so.
For those who are wondering what company I am referring to, I am sure you know how to find me.