Twitter feeds as seen behind-the-scenes at Rupp Arena. (Photo courtesy of Paul Hooper)
Communication through social media means customer complaints might have a global audience. A single grievance can snowball into much more, but today’s social media experts are quick to see potential in the issues their guests post to Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat, among others. Many see complaints as an opportunity to let people know that their voices are heard and, hopefully, create a sense of community with their guests.
“It’s really how you rectify the situation, which is probably the most important piece of it,” said Cara Vanderhook, senior director of communications and social media at Staples Center and Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles. She shared an example in which a customer posted a complaint that they missed a promotional discount on a jersey they had just purchased. To make up for it, the facility sent a staff member to the guest’s seat to apologize, return the jersey they got, then brought the item back with the discount.
“I think that is the cool part about social media, in that there really is no limit,” Vanderhook said. She said that on the flip side, cutting corners when it comes to watching out for complaints is not an option. “There’s not an easy way to do it other than to always be on and looking at the app mentions and see who they are,” said Vanderhook.
Paul Hooper, marketing manager at Rupp Arena in Lexington, Ky., advised sharing the load by utilizing as much of the facility’s staff as possible to handle social media complaints. By showing ticketing services and security how to set up search fields for particular key words and even threats, Hooper said staff members outside of marketing can help a lot in the social media space.
“I think the more you can spread out and use the power of everyone in your company the better,” Hooper said.
Hooper added that answering a guest’s question on a public forum can also be a useful way to inform others. For example, people might ask why they are not allowed to bring cameras into the facility. “Often, for every one person that has a question about something, there are 50 other people that would never ask it but also have the same question,” he said.
Issues brought up by guests can also be useful for operations staff. As much as teams work to catch anything that needs fixing in a facility, Vanderhook said that attendees will tag venues with notes about a loose armrest, for example. She shared that she will address the situation, while taking care to avoid words like “issue” or “problem” to keep a positive light on whatever the comment may be. Vanderhook said that messages like these can also be useful as a stand-in of sorts for surveys, which will see a 10 percent response rate on a good day.
Rosie Selle, director of marketing for AEG Facilities at KeyArena in Seattle, highlighted the importance of promptness in responding to attendees. Selle does not like to “leave people hanging,” citing an “old adage that social media has become your front door, and if you just let people knock and don’t answer, sometimes that can make the situation worse.”
She shared the example of an attendee claiming that a staff member knocked over their new bottle of water and did not apologize for it. The tweet started to gain steam. Selle direct-messaged the guest to ask where they were and what happened exactly. She apologized to the attendee and told them where to meet her to get another bottle. The guest turned it down, but then proceeded to commend the arena on Twitter to all of their followers.
“That was really the end goal,” Selle said. “We don’t want them to never want to come back to the building because of some experience that could have been easily solved by a direct message.”
Keeping one’s emotions out of any exchanges helps to maintain a professional approach as well, according to Hooper. “It’s so easy to get wrapped up in complaints on social media,” said Hooper. “Sometimes people can be so unreasonable, even if you write and draft the most amazing tweet or Facebook post response that answers all of their questions and explains all their grief.”
Pragmatic approaches can also help to prevent “flame wars,” Hooper said, in which people will turn on each other on the venue’s account. He said his own personal policy is to not delete comments unless they are especially demeaning, negative or inappropriate. Once they cross this line, Hooper said he will delete the conversation entirely and leave a message asking people to take that kind of speech elsewhere and act friendly in this forum.
Selle said that letting people know their voice has been heard can do a lot to dilute anger on social media before it starts. "A lot of the people that use social media just want to be heard."
Discerning just how much one can do for a person is another vital part of the job, Selle said. Sometimes pleasing an unhappy customer is just not in the cards.
In the end, Selle said that being a good listener is the best policy.
Shani Tate, vice president of marketing, communications and ticket sales for AEG at Sprint Center, Kansas City, Mo., agreed that there is much value to be found in customer complaints.
“We view it as an opportunity for dialog with our guests,” Tate said.
“It’s critical to developing your community, and this is just one part, a very vital part, of having that two-way conversation.”
Interviewed for this story: Paul Hooper, (859) 233-4567 x3291; Rosie Selle, (206) 437-3497; Shani Tate, (816) 949-7170; Cara Vanderhook, (213) 742-7273