Get 'personal' for better customer loyalty: Twitter

Brands that get personal in customer service interactions do far better than those that keep it businesslike, a study by Twitter said.

When it comes to customer service, authentic humanity works very well, it said. "Customers are really looking for a humanised connection. They want to feel that they are talking to a real person and having that personalisation helps add that component," Twitter research manager Meghann Elrhoul was quoted as saying in a Marketingland.com report.

"This is an easy step that brands can take to forge the relationship," she said. The comparison, drawn from a survey of 14,000 people who engaged with brands' customer service Twitter accounts, is stark.
When brands created personal interactions -- defined as conversations that included the customer's name and the customer service representative's signature in tweets 77 percent of those customers were likely to recommend the brand.

On the other hand, when the interaction was not personal, 66 percent said they were unlikely to recommend the brand. Customers were also 19 percent more likely to reach a resolution and 22 percent more likely to be satisfied after personalised conversations, the study said.

"We have seen that in some of our focus groups that consumers will, before they interact with a brand, go to a brand's Twitter page to see how they are interacting with consumers," Elrhoul said. "They see that brands are doing it and doing it right, so they know they will get the response they are looking for," she said.

Customer service interactions are accelerating on Twitter. The company reports a 250 percent increase in such conversations in the last two years.