Remember the unspoken rule which says that you “shouldn’t automate your Twitter account”? We’ve all read that one before, but today I’d like to prove to you that you can actually automate your Twitter account…. with a little bit of creativity.
For some reason my attention is always drawn towards how airlines are using social media. Maybe it’s because I spend countless hours searching for affordable fares and promotions to satisfy my hunger to travel. I love to check out the numerous airlines available and this might’ve indirectly led me to cover numerous articles on how airlines are using social media, as well as their failures and success.
Back to our topic, KLM have always been one of the leaders in social media. KLM is one of the heavyweights because not only had they listened to their customers on Twitter, they react remarkably well to them offline (like surprising them at the airports). This shows that KLM have an outstanding view of how their online and offline operations could work together. Recently, they took tweeting to a whole new level by developing an automated process of searching tickets by using Twitter.
Usually, to find tickets online we’d need to go to the airlines’ website, select the place you’d like to travel to, the date, the return date, the one-way or return options, the number of guests, the number of children… Tedious? Well KLM certainly thinks so because now KLM allows you to tweet them at @KLMFares to get the prices of the ticket in 1 minute. Yup! One minute! I’m sure you wouldn’t be able to do that on the website.
All we have to do is tweet @KLMFares+location
Example: Customers can simply tweet “@KLMFares Singapore to Amsterdam”. You can also include the day or the month you’d like to travel as well. I decided to search using the month.
Within a minute, KLMFares responded with the lowest fare as well as the link to the website to book the ticket.
I’m not sure about you, but I think this is really innovative because, since it is an automated reply, customers won’t have to wait for the person behind the Twitter account to respond (which we all know would usually take more than a minute to do so).
Here is a video for a clearer explanation
KLM clearly understood that mobile will be huge this year. They’ve combined mobile and social extremely well to deliver another satisfying service to their customers.
What about personal touch? Isn’t that what Twitter is about? Well, yes! What KLM is doing is making it easy and helping the users’ experience. However, KLM clearly haven’t forgotten about their infamous personal touch, because they still continue to dazzle their customers through their main account @KLM
What do you think? Love to hear your thoughts. Do you see the potential of automating twitter?
Related posts:
[...] Creative way to automate your twitter account for success Via Twitter kun je nu eenvoudig bij KLM de prijzen voor vliegtickets opvragen, geheel geautomatiseerd. Het lijkt erop dat bedrijven dit soort toepassingen nu gaan gebruiken om voor menskracht te besparen in hun webcare-teams. Door naar KLM je vertrek- en aankomstplaats te tweeten krijg je binnen een minuut de prijzen terug. [...]
[...] Aaron Lee put the system to the test and found out that it works quite well: [...]