First, I’ve got to say that having your personal Twitter handle in the Radian6 bio clearly works on some level, because when I saw that you’d commented on my blog post, it was like hearing from a famous person.

Anyway. Yes that’s really interesting that Radian6 has its own support handle but that you don’t mention that in the Radian6 bio! I’m sure it’s posted somewhere obvious on your website, but my guess is that the average costumer (if they’re an avid Twitter user) isn’t going to go poking around on the website. By the way, according to the @Radian6Support bio, it is not monitored 24/7: “Radian6 Support Hours Sunday 9pm EST to Friday 9pm EST.”

I also really want to know how you separate your personal Twitter life from your professional Twitter life. Or maybe that’s a good thing – only one Twitter handle to check. On the other hand, you’re technically always available, right? If your handle is right there, how do you prevent someone from Tweeting you whenever, and then getting angry if they don’t hear back right away? (Because you were -*gasp*- having a life on a Saturday?) Couldn’t the bio just have your first names, and when you reach out via a Radian6 handle you could sign it using your first name or initials? Was there a reason you didn’t set up your Twitter customer service like Comcast did – i.e. @ComcastBill, @ComcastMelissa, etc? Couldn’t you be @Radian6Genevieve?

For the record, I think Radian6 is a great product and I didn’t mean to call you out specifically in a negative way; I was genuinely fascinated that you had your hours listed, since everyone seems to assume that social media is 24/7/365.

This is a fascinating topic and I appreciate you commenting on my post.

Great topic for conversation, thanks for bringing it up.

As a company we have a 10 minute response window we aim to hit for all Twitter posts during our posted hours especially those with customer issues & questions. We do maintain that our corporate channel is there as an avenue for our customers & community to reach out with questions or issues, but we also have a separate handle designed specifically to connect people with our Support team (@radian6support) and we also have a channel dedicated for training resources (@radian6training). Even though our main corporate handle only operates during specific time frames, customer issues & questions are monitored 24/7 and responded/handled by other teams beside the listed Community members.

You raised a good point that we could improve our twitter bio by having that information included, which we’ve flagged to discuss as a team.

As a company, we believe that our employees are our brand and that even though these are our personal handles, the value we bring from our personal perspectives can help to spread our brand message. It is a fine line to distinguish between personal and professional tweets, but it does give us the advantage of being able to connect with people on a 1 to 1, upfront manner.

For your overall question, I think that as long as a brand is honest with their clients, sets expectations up front and does their best to provide as many avenues as possible for support through things like self help, FAQ, blogs and an active community, that they are on the right road to providing that 24/7/365 feel.

Do you have any thoughts on ways that we could help provide better service to our community? We’re very excited to discuss as a team the changes we could make to our twitter bio in order to improve the experience for those in need of support, but would love to hear any other ideas you have!

Thank you again for bringing up this topic!

All the best,
@genevievecoates
Community Manager – Radian6