Needless to say, Social Media has changed the way we interact with friends, family, and even brands. It makes life easier, and connectivity simpler in many ways. However, it can also bring down big brands, when they push around their customers!

This is my personal story, and I am sure almost everyone who reads this post would have at some point of another been messed about by big brands, be it ISPs, Food Labels, Clothing Labels, Hotels, and most of all Airlines! However, before I share my story on how Social Media, mainly Twitter brought down 2 major world airlines to their knees, I would like to say, I am not a fan of Twitter Spamming, and it isn’t something I or ABSEM advocate. On the flip side, it has helped me resolve issues with 2 of the airlines when all of their customer service call centres failed to assist.

Issue with Swiss:

1. I received my baggage, with the handle broken.
2. The company dealing with their baggage handling is a 3rd party and not Swiss Directly.
3. Not only were the baggage handling company incompetent, I kept getting a push around from them and claims that they did send someone to pick up the broken bag (twice) and no one was home (lies).
4. Swiss’s customer service number would keep routing to other countries, where the call centre operatives kept taking my details and claim issues over and over again, with the same response, “we are so sorry, I will look into this and get someone to call you asap…”

Issue with JetAirways:

1. Like a little child, I love the window seats, and enjoy gazing out when on long haul flights. I specifically asked them for a window seat in their Business Class cabin. They did give me a window seat, however, it was the 1st row, which had no windows.
2. My seat was broken, the massager wouldn’t stop working (which was irritating), and the onboard television was rattling throughout the flight.
3. I requested the cabin crew to either change my seat, or fix it, or move me to first class if they couldn’t move me to another seat (I wasn’t keen on first class, as much as I was to get my monies worth i.e. a decent business class seat).
4. Not only did they refuse to change my seat, they were embarrassing themselves by trying to fix the rattling television set with pieces of paper, like you would to stabilise a wobbling table or chair.
5. Needless to point out, their customer service via email and phone calls did nothing but a generic “sorry…” message.
6. On my return flight, they took the cake! Mind you, again Business Class, with proof of further 2 more trips already booked for the same cabin with JetAirways, they harassed me over a mere 10 KGs of over weight.
7. I showed the Duty Manager the emails back and forth, my experience with my outbound flight from LHR-DEL, and my additional upcoming bookings. His response at DEL, “Sorry, whilst we appreciate your feedback and for you to fly with us again, I can’t do anything about the LHR-DEL sector now except say sorry. As for your overweight luggage, I cannot overlook that so you will have to pay $300 for it.”

Exhausted! Like most of you who might have had issues with airlines, you know how they can push you around and all you do is just feel helpless. Well, like I said, I am not a big fan of spamming on Twitter, but desperate times call for desperate measures.

How Did Twitter Bring Down Swiss & JetAirways?

1. I created more than 200 random tweets expressing my experience with the 2 airlines over and over again.
2. I started re-tweeting negative experience tweets from others for the 2 airlines in addition.
3. I shared all the contact details of everyone who ever spoke to me from the airline publicly on twitter and shared how pathetically helpless they were.
4. I repeated all of the above, again and again!

So what was the result?

1. I got a call from Swiss HQ, and the Head of Customer Services immediately resolved the issue and refunded me for my bag they broke.
2. I got a call from JetAirway’s GM of Customer Services, apologising for the experience I had, and offered me 4 upgrade vouchers with a combined value of 1 Business Class Return trip.

At the end, both airlines, were so fed up by the flood of negative Social PR they received, they had no other option but to contact me directly, rather than some call centre executive calling to tell me they can’t help me. At the end of it, as a paying customer all I/We expect is to get our monies worth!

What Can We Learn from This?

1. Social Media today is more powerful than brands think.
2. It has the potential to make a brand or break a brand.
3. Do not abuse it’s power, and your privilege to use it.
4. Listen to what your customers have to say, before the matter gets out of hand.
5. Engage with your customers, and resolve their issues asap.
6. More importantly, train your customer service agents outside of Social Media Management to resolve the issues before they go viral.

For more insight into the tweets, feel free to visit my personal Twitter Profile: Naval Kumar