4 customer service lessons from social media disasters

Raj GroverDirector, Ecommerce Client

ServicesBarclays Bank

Social Media has empowered individuals

Customer ServiceBefore: A satisfied customer will tell 2-3 people about his experience, unhappy will tell with 6-8 people Now: A satisfied customer will tell 4-6 people about his experience, unhappy will share with thousands and thousands of people

Social Media is an amplifier

Lesson 1. Bad customer service in the real world is amplified on social mediaExample 1.Man Spends More Than $1,000 to Call Out British Airways on Twitter - viewed more than 50,000 times

Lesson 1. Bad customer service in the real world is amplified on social mediaExample 2. Desperate Comcast Rep Refuses to Cancel a Customer’s Service - listened to 6m times

Lesson 2. Customers always had a choice (to walk away) now they have a voice, and it can be heard on social mediaJeff Jarvis – “Now consumers don't just consume. We spit back. We have our own printing presses.”

Lesson 3. Social Media Cannot be controlled• Too many channels• Moves too quickly• Blunders are immortalized

DELETING COMMENTS, DELETING CUSTOMERS: CHAPSTICK FAILS ON FACEBOOK ChapStick Gets Itself in a

Social Media Death Spiral A brand's silent war against its Facebook fansThe lesson learned Never silence your critics because they will find a way to publicize their views

#McDStories when a hashtag becomes a bashtagMcDonald's Twitter Campaign Goes Horribly Wrong

Lessons Learned.• Take care in using something

that could act as a red flag to consumers

• The minute the comments became raucous or funny enough, they turned into a news story

• A "flash crisis“ - Reacting after the fact is almost impossible because there isn't a specific complaint or customer problem to address

Lesson 4. Manage with authentic customer service, engage your customers quicklyExample (Bad) - Honda fan on Facebook, Eddie Okubo, turns about to be product Manager at Honda

Lesson 4. Manage with authentic customer service, engage your customers quicklyExamples (good)- AirAsia's Facebook presence is outstanding, make

sure they reply to as many comments as it can. 3 Million likes.

- JetBlue’s 1.7 million strong Twitter following asks questions ranging from flight schedules to ticket problems

- Microsoft’s @XboxSupport account holds the Guinness World Record for being the most responsive brand on Twitter

- Nike created a separate Twitter account just for responding to customer inquiries and issues: @NikeSupport