Hey Orcon - Is this similar to a nightmare?

Youch.

For a few days I have seen tweets coming through from @timkelleher in regards to him not having Internet or phone from Orcon. Now, knowing my reliance on the internet, I can imagine how frustrating it is to be without.

So, I don't know the full back story on this, but I imagine it is 'sign up - no internet or phone - get frustrated - take things into my own hands'.

Tim has created a website fifteen which is counting up how many days, hours, mins and seconds he has been waiting for Orcon to connect his phone and internet. It also has a tally of how long he has spent on the phone with technical support (which I image is all cell phone based since he has no landline...)

Then, like all smart Twitter users, he is utilising this medium to try to force a response, he has placed a tweet link on the bottom right corner.

And the tweets just keep coming. 

The above shows 8 tweets in 7 minutes. This must be SO frustrating for the people who run the @Orcon twitter account. Obviously they do not have the power to fix this directly, but do the have the power to elicit a response for poor Tim? You have to admit, he must be pretty pissed off to go out of his way to build this site.

I have had excellent action from the likes of @vodafoneNZ in my own experience, fixing issues and answering questions within minutes.

I think I have said it before, but Twitter continues to put power in the consumers hands. Back in my days of retail, I was often told, "a happy customer will tell, on average, 2 people about their experience, an unhappy customer, 11 people". That little line was enough for me to ensure all customers walked out of the store happy. Twitter has magnified the opportunity to express satisfaction, or lack thereof. 

Tim has 663 followers. 

Ben Gracewood tweeted, he has 4,300+ followers.

Ken Freer 1,500 followers

Ben and Ken are just 2 of what looks like over 100 people who have tweeted about this. The reason I picked out those other 2 is because they're quite vocal in the telco space and is often the reason people follow them.

This whole thing is quickly turning into something of a PR disaster. I don't have the answer on how to fix it, but personally, if I was running the Orcon account, I would put out a tweet acknowledging all of the support for Tim and reassure that they are doing everything possible to rectify this issue. From their current twitter stream, it looks like they are just ignoring it. I don't believe this to be a smart move. 


Twitter has given people a voice. They want to be heard. Ignoring them, will just make them louder.


Good luck Tim, hope you get your Internets quickly.

How do you use Twitter?

Twitter is a curious beast. I have been using it for about 9 months now and have managed 2,000+ tweets. Scarily, that averages approx 7 tweets a day. At present I have about 510 followers, and I would hazard a guess that whilst I follow potentially up to 250/300 of those people back 80% of them I don't know exactly who they are or what they do.

Because of the incredibly open nature of Twitter, I (try to) make a point of not mouthing off too much. Granted I do sometimes, but I don't say anything that I would freak out if the

person/company involved found out about. This is sometimes frustrating as you know it would make you feel better if you could let all those people know exactly what you think, but hey, we had to handle frustrations before Twitter, so I go with more traditional methods in these instances.

Sometimes, something does really bug you though, and because you know the company are on Twitter, sometimes you send a tweet to see how responsive they may be. I certainly have done this twice with @vodafoneNZ and I have to say, both times I have had a phenomenal response. My issues were solved amazingly quickly, leaving me with a brilliant brand experience and creating something of a brand advocate. One of my issues I attempted to solve through the call centre and hit a wall. I honestly believe that if I had not had direct contact with @vodafoneNZ, it would not have been resolved, and Vodafone would have lost an incredibly loyal customer (same cell number for 9 years).

On the other hand, I attempted to obtain information from @bloomcosmetics and while I did get an initial response (an unhelpful one) they never replied to my second call for help via Twitter. Colour me unloved. I have since moved on from the brand and probably won't purchase again. Yes, I am just one person, but I would hazard a guess this may have not just happened to me.

Now, what happens when a Twitterer vents on Twitter, in the hopes (I'm guessing) of gaining some form of a response from the company involved, and whilst the COMPANY come back with a very tempered response and solves this problem, an employee of this company (who the Twitterer unfortunately happened to be following) very openly bitches about what is going on. What then?

What we need to remember about Twitter and this goes all the way to celebrities (talk about PR nightmares!) is that because you have little control over who can see what you are tweeting, you are opening yourself and your tweets up to the world. Little mini press releases depending on who you are and who is following you. Are you really sure you know exactly who those 10/50/100/500 are, who they work for and how what you say could turn around and bite you in the arse?

Recently the lovely @livlarge sent out a Tweet which I think is something that more people (and companies) should embrace, maybe even take on as their ethos?

And then, employees should be reminded that even though it may be your personal account, unfortunately at the end of the day, we are all associated with our place of employment, and perhaps Twitter is not the place to vent all issues.

Can't control competitors advertising...

Sucks huh? Here is GeekZone reporting on Vodafone's announcement of the Google HTC Magic - by the way, Vodafone, if you're listening (I mean reading) and want someone to you test this bad boy out on, my hand is up - and there is freaking XT advertising all the way around it. Nice try Telecom, but I think Vodafone is still the winner on the day here.

I can't wait for the HTC.