The Business of Twitter for Business

As a follow up to the 3 Social Media Tips I’ve shared with you this month, I have a Twitter Tip for Businesses.

First off, did you catch my comments that Twitter is often best used as a customer service tool instead of a promotion tool for most businesses, like the one I worked for last year?

Recently I had an example of how this works in my life.

I was getting ready to paint a couple of walls at home and I decided to check in @Lowes on FourSquare and share it on my Twitter account.

They responded back to me on Twitter even though I was not asking them anything.

Take a look:

@ScLoHo Scott, what’ca working on today. Let us know if we can be of assistance. Have a wonderful weekend and thank you for choosing Lowe’s.

— Lowe’s (@Lowes) January 11, 2014

This made me feel good.  Here’s why:

• 1st off this was not likely an automated message.  How do I know?  Because they used my first name, not just my Twitter handle.
• 2nd is it was engaging.  They asked a question and offered help.  I did not need any help, but here they were, using my favorite social media platform (Twitter) and being nice.

Now I also suspect that the rest of the Tweet, the part after my name, was a canned response that they copy and paste, but who cares.  I sometimes use canned emails in my own marketing that I personalize for each recipient.

They also get props for being timely.  I checked in on FourSquare as I was waiting for my paint. They tweeted back at me in less than 3 minutes.

Recently I sent a tweet to a local business asking a question and it took 3 weeks for them to respond. Not good.

Take away lesson for business:  Monitor your Twitter account and also use it to provide customer service to your customers.