Tweet, tweet

I'm a Twitter lover. I've written about this obsession before, but lately I've used the social media platform to express my likes and dislikes regarding businesses that I use. Again, been there, done that, but hey, it's an entry and one that might help others. If you don't have a Twitter account, get one. It's a platform for saying all of those things that rattle around inside your head that you don't necessarily want to say out loud for fear of being looked at funny. Hey, on Twitter you can't see the people rolling their eyes. It's also a wonderful place to type out frustrations too.

I use my Twitter for mainly sports. During the football season, I'm on Twitter 24/7. I follow all of the Pittsburgh Steelers players, sports writers, Heinz Field employees, and other Steelers fans. They all keep me updated on everything black and gold. I follow other sports figures, mainly my favorites, but also accounts of players I admire or who just make me laugh. I follow authors, television actors, newspaper writers, colleges, and anyone who says interesting things that I want to read. I love Twitter.

Recently, during a period of several cable outages at the end of the football season, I was on hold with our cable company when an automated voice told me that I should report my issue via Twitter to the handle @Wowcares. Since I had been on hold for fifteen minutes while my husband, he who rarely watches football, ranted and raved because he was missing the National Championship game in college football being played one county over, I hung up and tweeted as the voice had suggested. Immediately, I got a response, and the next day I had a cable employee at my house who totally rewired my house. Not long after that, I watched a celebrity on Live with Kelly tell his Twitter story. His wife had left her laptop on an airplane and could not get anyone to help her. The airport people gave her a phone number to call, and the phone number never got her a human so the celebrity tweeted his frustration to the airline. He got a response and his wife got her laptop. He felt it was a case of his stardom and his one million followers, but I'm here to tell you that Twitter isn't just for the powerful people.

Now days companies with a salt have employees who do nothing but monitor social media sites looking to put out fires. My neighbor called me recently to gripe about the same cable company. She had recently switched to WOW on my suggestion, and had, after only two weeks of installation, lost her cable twice. She was not happy, and I immediately felt responsible. Knowing she didn't have Twitter, I tweeted to the same handle that had taken care of me previously, and after getting a response and giving them her account number and issue, she had her cable up and running in a half an hour, and a man at her house the next day to go over her installation. My neighbor thinks I'm a magician and is looking into the "whole Twitter thing".

While at the grocery a month ago, I stepped away from my cart and someone took the opportunity to steal my four Publix $1.99 reusable bags.  I didn't discover the theft until I got to the checkout lane, but after several discussions with employees and customer service I went to my car and tweeted my frustration. I mean, who steals reusable bags? I didn't tweet to complain about the company. I tweeted to bitch, to make myself feel better, but I used Publix's Twitter handle, and within five minutes someone from Publix reached out to me. I had multiple discussions with Catalina from @PublixHelps, who tried to find me some replacement bags. When she couldn't get me the exact ones that I had lost, she sent me some new bags, along with a lovely card. It took the sting out of my loss.

On the other side of this, I also tweet my happiness with businesses. Today I tweeted because I've used Walgreens photo department in the past two weeks for cards, a photo book, a poster, and prints. They have done a remarkable job, and so I tweeted my happiness. I feel it works both ways. Shout
out to those who go above and beyond! It's like filling out a comment card.

Darcy: "Yeah, but mom, you've bitched about three companies in the last two months. People are going to think all you do is complain on Twitter."

Me: "Hey, is it my fault that the last month has sucked in the business world? I'm doing these businesses a world of good by pointing out their errors. How else can they work on it?"

She rolled her eyes. I know she did.