How Social Media Won Me-The #Jetairways Story

The Background:

It was an average end to a morning service flight. Standing next to the belt was me waiting anxiously for my baggage. Ahead of me beyond the airport lay series of meeting, presentation and anticipation of cracking an all elusive deal. Baggage delay was the least that I anticipated.

The Priority membership assured the baggage to come first. The bags start to roll in and to my dismay my Priority tagged Bag came the last. Gloom sets in, the feeling of being cheated by the very airline I flew almost 8 sectors in a week was unbearable. I opened the Twitter app and tweeted my grievance with @Jetairways and #Jetairways marked prominently. I wanted the whole world to know on what I went through,

It was only matter of hours, when to my pleasant surprise was a reply from Jet. Yes they have listened to me and not just heard. The tweet had the fullness of life and not a bot-ish reply. The most popular airline in India seemed just a tweet away to me. Over couple of tweets and phone calls from the concerned from Jetairways,  my baggage delay was escalated to reasonable levels and now I rarely get the opportunity to complain to that issue. Jetairways listened all because of the social media team intervention at the right time.

My pet peeve was sorted and from an "angry not so young man" with Anti Jetairways sentiments, I got converted into a brand ambassador for Jetairways especially on the social media.

What went right:
That was the story so far and its time for a quick introspection on what went right from the moment my first tweet was sent to the social media team. My views are summarized as under:

1. The tweet was replied within a short span of time - By this I got the confidence that this co. means business
2. The content of the tweet- The 140 characters had my name in it followed by an apology. Personal touch was immediately seen.
3. Tone of the tweet - The first feeling I got was that someone "human" was there who was keen to listen and also would be a solution provider rather than the gimmick solutions provider we interact when we call the mobile cos. help line in India 
4. The follow up -  The Tweet and the reply was not the end of the matter. The social media team at Jet ensured an escalation which was followed by the customer care dept making a phone call to my delight.
5. Closing the loop -  Once the issue was resolved the social media team ensured to close the loop
6. My open appreciations - My Thank You sent as a Tweet to Jetairways closed the complaint as well as informed the public that the Social Media team resolved my issue. It was actually my way of expressing gratitude to the Jetairways social media team :)

What is required before the Social Media team is set up:

In this subsection I share my thoughts on what makes social media a success for an organization.

1. Strong infrastructure: Jetairways seemed to have the a strong infrastructure and a proper communication channel to resolve issues. Aviation industry has the benefit of getting complaints after the service has been executed. This benefit does not go with other service industry like Phone cos. automobile cos, banks etc. So having a good social media team and a back up customer care will in fact help aviation attend to customer grievances better. 
2. The Right Social Media Team : Jetairways had the right bunch of people manning the social media deck. Be it Facebook or Twitter they interacted with people the way the people wanted to. 
3. Right Content: No unnecessary promotions or spams. Just plain good talking in the most uncomplicated way with smileys etc. This, as I mentioned earlier, gave the human touch. 

Conclusion:

Social Media when handled the right way can create brand ambassadors against having bad influencers. This tool was not available in the early part of the 21st century. With competition picking up, retaining customers should be focus of Cos. and what better way to connect in the current scenario than the social media way. Email responses to me are monologue and slow but social media gives a simplified two way interaction. 

Taking cue from my experiences shared above, do hope to see more service providers ramp up to : Be With Customers so the Customers are Listened to and not just Heard. 

And to the Jetairways Social Media- You have won a customer for life!

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