If you want to use Facebook to rant about a bad customer experience, you'll be better served complaining on Target's wall than Walmart's.
Target is more likely to pay attention to customers on social media than Walmart, Costco and other retailers, according to a new study conducted by New York University and Conversocial, a social customer service company. For the survey, roughly 600 American were asked to rate their satisfaction with the way in which 38 different brands handled social media interactions.
Subway received the highest approval rating in the dining category, topping McDonalds, Starbucks, 7-Eleven and Burger King, while JCPenny beat out Nordstorm and other apparel competitors. Respondents generally preferred their interactions with department stores and dining businesses to those with banks and telecom companies. (h/t Daily Mail)
So why should companies care? Almost 90 percent of those surveyed said they were less likely to purchase products from a company that does not pay attention to their complaints on Twitter or Facebook. Nearly that high of a percentage said social media will in the future trump all other modes of customer service communication, according to another survey conducted by Conversocial and NYU earlier this year.
Consumers typically turn to social media when they haven't been able to receive help via phone or email, Joshua March, CEO and co-founder of Conversational, told The Huffington Post. March said that bad customer service experiences happen when companies leave a single social media manager to deal with thousands of customers. Those managers, not equipped to deal with customer issues, end up telling an already frustrated consumer to call customer service, he added.