How many times have you thought when experiencing a negative service experience: “if only I knew who to talk to, I would give them a piece of my mind … right now!” Mobile and social tools now make that possible, and even a little bit too easy. Despite the risk that you might say something faster than you have time to edit it, I think that Twitter is an excellent tool for Customer Service. There are three basic reasons why it excels here:
Reason #1: Twitter gives the organization immediate feedback
Too often, a customer will have a problem, shrug it off as something that will never get attention, and never bring it to the notice of the company or service. Twitter gives the organization immediate feedback. Whether you’re great or whether you haven’t exactly wowed someone, it’s a lot easier to respond if you at least know that there is a problem.
Reason #2: The Organization or Company has some frame of reference already established for the customer
When you get a random phone call, how easy is it to know who’s calling, understand a bit of their personality and motivation, and have the opportunity to think about what you’re going to say to them? Sounds kind of hard. Twitter gives that to you in a nice neat package and shows you whether the caller is popular, well-connected, or not and what kind of persona they portray on their social media pages.
Reason #3: 140 characters makes everyone get to the point. Fast.
It’s very easy to scan a 140 character message and to quickly understand the situation. Of course, there’s always the problem that the caller is not quite specific enough for you to be able to solve the problem. But most of the time, having a constraint is good — it forces the customer to quickly state the problem, and you to answer it succinctly.
Twitter is great for Customer Service. Giving another channel to the customer, getting and giving instant feedback, having an idea of who they are and why they’re calling, and having to do that concisely makes the Customer Service process move better and faster.
Information Maven 
Good post Greg.
Another great thing that happens is the ability to respond before anyone expects it. In the past we always have to call or email to complain but now we can just post it to ourselves and then if someone is listening we will get a response. The mentality of someone listening is completely different than me telling.
I have never been one to call and complain about something but I would be more apt to post it to my twitter if I was dissatisfied. If I then hear a response I feel this different type of respect that I didn’t get otherwise and thus reinforces the new type of customer service that you are talking about here.
Thanks,
Shane Mac