Written by Jonathan Cervantes, Account Executive for Constellation Brands. 

We’ve all been there—after a long day of travel, the airline you flew on loses your baggage. After conversing with the baggage claim manager, you begin to feel that it’s useless to continue the conversation. Instead of persisting to express your feelings on the matter with the manager—you realize that you have an entirely better idea: to just tweet at the company about it.

Within an hour or two, you get a response saying how sorry the company is along with a direct message asking for your email to “right the wrong” that was done to you. You no longer have to deal with an airline’s traditional way of handling disgruntled customers, through a long and outdated complaint system. The old days of dealing with customers’ misfortunes may soon be coming to an end—the new, technologically-advanced way is here. So, what roles do Twitter and other social media platforms play in HR and communication departments within companies?

Research has found that over the last several years, companies have begun to put an excessive amount of focus into their social media customer services. It is now called “social care” for several different reasons:

  1. Social care across all social media channels has become an extremely important in companies’ communication and public relations strategies.
  2. Most companies have focused predominately on their Twitter accounts because that specific platform has the most interaction with customers. One of the reasons Twitter dominates attention over other platforms is because it allows one-on-one interaction between companies and consumers.
  3. New positions such as “Social Media Managers” or “Social Media Communicators” have begun to become more popular, in order to help companies deal with the customer’s complaints.

Nearly all responses, regardless of the language used in a consumer’s tweet, respond in a proper, direct manner focusing on the issue at hand. Twitter also maintains the lowest average cost for operating across all social media platforms, making it an even more desirable platform to use.

In the evolving media culture we all live in now, it is imperative to continue to grow your media skills in social media practices whether it be through Twitter, Instagram or Facebook.

Jonathan Cervantes is a senior majoring in Public Relations at the University of Oregon. In addition to working as an account executive on the AHPR Constellation Brands account, he is a marketing intern with the Oregon Ducks Baseball Team, an Assistant Undergraduate Program Coordinator with the SOJC Advising office. He plans to pursue his career in sports media after finishing school this June.