Social Media....How important is it with businesses?

FOREVER PRESENCE, with its effortless getting and staying in touch, is already facilitating a deafening (well, metaphorically speaking) conversation, that will continue between friends, family, strangers, foes, and yes, brands, in every possible combination until the end of times.

And while we have no intention of re-hashing the benefits of co-creation, we just want to point out that, ten years after the cluetrain manifesto (‘markets are conversations’) was published, it took a real-time publishing / conversation platform like Twitter to entice (big) brands to finally publicly interact with their customers.

Not that the infrastructure (email! chat! comments!) wasn't already in place, or that consumers had no interest in interacting with companies (there must be a billion ignored consumer suggestions, complaints, comments, questions, and reviews floating around online), but it looks like the real-time, in-your-face, mass public conversation that is Twitter was just the straw that broke the camel's back.

Sure, Twitter is ‘just’ the next evolution in personal communications, and something newer will steal hearts in the future (Google Wave, anyone?), but unlike other Next Big Things, its low barriers to entry and ease of use are enticing even the most luddite consumers, celebrities and brands to join in. The forced brevity of tweets has helped, too: it's easier to deal with a barrage of interactions if both sides are limited to a maximum of 140 characters.

So while B2C brands that have jumped on the 'twitwagon' already use Twitter for anything from PR, news and marketing campaigns to Twitter-only sales offers to recruiting, the business reality is that conversations with customers are taking over, or will do so soon.

It gets better, though: for years, we only had William Sanders*, better known as the Starwood Lurker, to write about when it came to big brands monitoring and replying to customers' questions and suggestions in person. And we're talking championing them instead of sending them off empty-handed or referring them to yet another powerless customer support rep.

* Sanders spends 8 hours a day engaging in anything Starwood related on FlyerTalk.com, a community for avid business travelers, and has more than 17,000 posts to his name.

Now, all of a sudden, big brands have assigned Chief Bloggers, Directors of Digital Care, Customer Relationships Experts, Social Media Strategists, Heads of Social Media, and yes, ‘Corporate Twitterers’ to personally (wo)man their Twitter conversations. Oh well, better late than never...

Now, not surprisingly, after years of one-way conversations, brands that finally open up (like the twitter examples above) will first have to deal with a steady flow of pent-up anger, complaints and frustration from customers who previously haven't had anywhere else to go.

But over time, when honest problem-solving (in combination with improved performance, of course) will lead to more balanced relationships, the focus will shift to cooperation if not co-creation. Including brands actively initiating conversations.

The 100 most mentioned brands on Twitter

Brand	Mentions	Followers	Twitter
1	Starbucks	3.37m	120,868	@Starbucks
2	Google	1.01m	307,342	@Google
3	BBC	703,000	15.777	@bbcnews
4	Apple	512,110		None
5	AIG	455,000		None
6	Amazon	245,760	1007	@amazon
7	Microsoft	221,000		None
8	Guardian	211,000	14,913	@guardiannews
9	Dell	185,000	287,575
10	Coca-Cola	135,600		None
11	Ford	130,000	2,256	@ford
12	Sony PlayStation	117,550	20,651	@SonyPlayStation
13	eBay	107,000	1329	@ebayUK
14	Sony	107,000		None
15	Disney	106,000	7,354	@wdwnews
16	Yahoo!	94,500	9,541	@yahoo
17	Sky	74,370	10,248	@SkyNews
18	IKEA	72,300		None
19	IBM	70,400	1,180	@ibmevents
20	Nokia	68,100		None
21	Ford Scott Monty	62,600	16,562	@scottmonty
22	Guinness	59,700		None
23	HP	56,720	1,682	@hpnews
24	ComCast	50,400	14,688	@comcastcares
25	Skittles	48,600		None
26	Canon	48,200	605	@canon
27	McDonald's	45,340	234	@MONOPOLYatMcD
28	Channel 4	39,300	6,932	@channel4news
29	Lego	39,100		None
30	Pepsi	37,400	757	@pepsi
31	Samsung	35,800	582	@samsungmobileus
32	Intel	35,700	464	@intel
33	Tesco	35,500		None
34	Nike	32,800	1,167	@nikeplus
35	Honda	31,400	2,693	@Alicia_at_Honda
36	BMW	30,600	1,265	@BMWSauberF1Team
37	T-Mobile	29,900	1,443	@TMobile_USA
38	BT	27,540		None
39	FedEx	27,100	1,108	@mattceni
40	O2	25,900	2,371	@O2UKOfficial
41	Vodafone	25,400	802	@Vodafone_News
42	Bosch	25,300		None
43	RyanAir	25,200		None
44	Toyota	22,600	2,321	@toyotanewsroom
45	VW	22,190		None
46	Mercedes	21,600	1,506	@TheFifthDriver
47	Subway	21,200		None
48	Cadbury	19,900		None
49	Audi	18,600		None
50	Burger King	18,500	2,496	@thebklounge
51	Marmite	15,600		lovehatemarmite
52	Chanel	14,700		None
53	Citi	12,600		None
54	EasyJet	11,800		@easyjetservice
55	H&M	11,500	2,701	@handm
56	Porsche	10,600		None
57	Zara	10,000		None
58	Gucci	9,990	436	@gucciofficial
59	Nissan	9,740		@NissanSports
60	UPS	8,960	5,381	@trackthis
61	Motorola	8,320	346	@motodev
62	Avon	8,132		None
63	Marks & Spencer	7,900		None
64	Heinz	7,500		None
65	Royal Bank of Scotland	6,945		None
66	Asda	6,650	147	@asda
67	Accenture	5,970	2,126	@Accenture
68	HSBC	5,760		None
69	Lexus	5,690		None
70	British Airways	5,670	1,202	@British_Airways
71	Siemens	5,640		None
72	Gillette	5,250		None
73	Barclays	4,840		None
74	Sainsbury's	4,300		None
75	Budweiser	3,980		None
76	Louis Vuitton	3,950		None
77	Lovefilm	3,720	1,503	@lovefilm_uk
78	Smirnoff	3,380	514	@Smirnoff_EXP
79	Banco Santander	3,330		None
80	UBS	3,330		None
81	Shell	3,100		@shelldotcom
82	Colgate	2,870		None
83	L'Oreal	2,813		None
84	Citroen	2,810		None
85	Rolex	2,630		None
86	Cartier	2,100		None
87	Knorr	2,030		None
88	PG Tips	1,400		None
89	Oxo	829		None
90	Birdseye	748		None
91	Levi's	700		None
92	Specsavers	665		None
93	Duracell	621		None
94	BP	600		None
95	Schweppes	570		None
96	Habitat	500		None
97	Direct Line	500		None
98	Andrex	474		@Andrexpuppy
99	Vauxhal	470		@vauxhallnewsuk
100	Dulux	208		None