Nearly a month ago, I blogged about the evident lack of customer service over at Twitter. I concluded by saying, “Looks like a week of kvetching has had some effect. I hope the effect holds.”

It hasn’t.

In the weeks since that original post, the Twitter account in question has been hacked several more times. Since April 28 I’ve sent more than 50 emails about the issue to Twitter “support.”

The account is fine for a few days, then it reverts to the type of page you see in the screen shot above. The latest compromise to the account occurred yesterday, evidently sometime late in the morning or early in the afternoon.

(As of about 9:00 this morning, following a dozen emails yesterday to Twitter support as well as their PR, law enforcement, and partnership email addresses, the account remained compromised. By 10:00, though, it appears to have been fixed. But I can’t help wondering how long it will be before the next hack kicks in.)

I commented about the issue over on iMediaConnection, in response to an article about Twitter marketing experiments. I contacted the folks at an A-list social media site about this and received a response noting that “we have the same obstacles when reaching Twitter support.  It’s disappointing to say the least.” Out of respect to their direct request, I’m not mentioning the site’s name, but they are one of the 800-pound gorillas of social media. They have Twitter followers in the (very) high six figures  — and Twitter evidently ignores them, too.

So here’s the issue, and I think it’s a huge one:

As a marketer, you want to engage your customers and potential customers in social media. Twitter is at the eye of the social media hurricane, so you set up a Twitter account. You note your Twitter address on all communications, from emails to press releases to media alerts to blog postings to Facebook and Flickr and more.

But when your audience comes to your Twitter page, do they see the tweets you sent out yesterday? Do they see the branding you created for the Twitter page? Do they see the news and information you want to disseminate?

No. They see a page that looks like the screenshot accompanying this blog post.

Meanwhile, what about those people inside the brand’s organization who, after much cajoling and convincing, are taking that first tentative step into social media the way it ought to be done? Well, they’re asking legitimate questions:

“What the hell is going on? Is THIS what social media is all about? Seriously? Is THIS what you’re trying to sell as a cutting-edge marketing tactic?”

And they’re coming to conclusions:

“Social media sucks. My brand is being undermined. I shouldn’t be wasting time or money on this crap. This is a ridiculous mess.”

The articles being written daily about Twitter are over the top, and have been for some time. The tubes of the Interwebs are clogged with advice on how to use Twitter to make money, build your brand, connect with customers, be genuine, share information, advertise deals, identify influencers, open new marketing channels, transform media, and so on, and so on, and so on …

It’s time for marketers to sober up where Twitter is concerned.

Can it be a powerful tool? Yes. But: Twitter needs to improve system security and they need to start thinking about customer service for people like me, for the giant A-listers, and for everyone in between.

Because one smartass hacker plus one non-responsive support department can turn a social media strategy into a social media migrane in no time.

Takeaway for marketers: Thinking about using Twitter as a main tactic in your social media strategy? Proceed with extreme caution.

MAY 31 UPDATE: The answer to the question in the fifth paragraph above? About a half hour. It’s hacked again as I type this.

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 31st, 2009 at 9:57 am and is filed under Internet Stuff, Marketing Stuff, Marketing Takeaways, Quotes o' the Day, Rants 'n' Such, Social Media.