contributed by: Colleen Boyce

Gossip has existed as long as humans have.  It is simple, as people are curious, social creatures who learn from one another.  It makes sense that we share our problems, our friends’ problems, our friends’ friends’ problems, and so on.  We use this information to gain a better understanding of the world around us so that we can survive.  In that sense, gossip is a blessing.  

However, in the past, gossip would only spread so far.  It would stay isolated in the area of the incident or would become so outrageous that it turned into folk stories used to scare children into behaving.  Today, gossip, whether true or false, spreads to every corner of the earth because of advancements in technology, most notably social media.  

With one click of a button, information can be sent to the world and never taken back, which in most cases is not all that bad; it might even be funny.  On the other hand, that one little tweet or Facebook post can cost a company millions in damage control.  No matter how exceptional customer service may be at a company, it only takes one person slightly faltering to cause an explosion. Anyone working in a business that interacts with people knows how serious the damage can be.  

This drives at the question, was social media a blessing or a curse for big businesses?  With it came new opportunities to advertise, a new wealth of information on customers, and a portal for users to share their exciting experiences with a company.  Some will argue that outweighs the cost of one bad mistake, and maybe it does for companies that can afford to make a mistake.

Others are not so lucky, but there are ways to prevent such disasters.  The easiest and most common solution is to have your employees trained to adhere by the age old adage, “the customer is always right.”  Another way is to have an alert set so that when a customer “hashtags” or discusses a company/brand then they are notified and are able to defuse the situation quickly and fairly quietly.  A slightly different solution would be preventing the problem before it is too far under way.  In this case, people who have a high number of followers are routed to the front of the line in the IVR because, if they have a complaint, they could cause the company the most damage.  

However, we will never be able to stop someone who, rather than seek help when they are unhappy with a product, instead turns to the internet to take out their frustration.  In this instance the only solution here is the goal of any company: produce the best product possible for your customers.