More on the @metrotrains Twitter insanity
They’re now deleting old tweets . What? Why? Then it hit me. The reason behind all these boneheaded shenanigans.
Someone in the Metro Trains PR department (or perhaps the CEO) decided to look at the @metrotrains Twitter account, probably because they went to a seminar on how important social media is. They were horrified to see pages and pages of mostly-negative news. “Service cancelled”, “service delayed”, “police action”, “ghost of Harold Holt scaring people at Malvern Station” (okay I made up the last one).
So their knee jerked, and they decided to get rid of all the negative and replace with positive. A perfectly logical reaction if you’re in PR and a) Think that Twitter is all about following celebrities, and b) Have no idea what your followers are actually following you for. So they’re only posting vague, useless service congestion tweets and PR doublespeak . What’s more, they’re deleting all the old, useful “negative” tweets, so that when people look at the web page, it’ll look all happy and positive. Useless for the train-riding public, but the CEO will love it. And if the CEO loves it, so will the PR department.
Here’s what I’d do if I ran the place:
- Keep the useful “negative” tweets about service disruptions and changes, because that’s the reason people are following the company.2. Add some PR fluff: human interest stories, advocacy stuff, safety reminders, contests, other fun things. That will please the CEO.3. Actually engage with the people who are talking about Metro Trains on Twitter. Telstra’s Twitter account is actually doing a really good job with this. They’re frequently proactive with responding to complaints, even if it’s obvious that the person is just having a whinge. (Yes, I know, I’m saying nice things about Telstra’s customer service. But really; credit where credit is due. They’re doing a very good job). Engaging with customers well creates happy customers, which tell other people about their experiences. It’s a slow process, but it works. Just look at Telstra.
For a company that needs all the goodwill it can get, it’s really sad and somewhat baffling to see Metro Trains throw so much of it away.
This entry is a followup of sorts to my previous one on the same topic.