Why Corporate Twitter “Conversations” Are Lies

Okay, folks, it’s time to interject a little honesty into the social media dialogue.

Despite grand platitudes of how Twitter is ‘shepherding a new era of corporate transparency and a spirit of engaging with customers,’ the fact remains that even the best corporate examples of such engagement on Twitter remain trivial at best.

Just because a company launches a Twitter page and assigns a marketing intern to tweet replies back to anyone who tweets them does not mean they have engaged in any kind of conversation or dialogue. They most certainly haven’t changed any paradigms, shifted any culture, or launched any new eras.

An @Reply Is Not a Conversation

Social media “evangelists” frequently fall into the mistake of trumping up this kind of direct contact as more than it is.

A conversation is not an answered question nor a thrown kudos. An example:

This friendly response to someone’s tweet is, to be sure, a nice little gesture on Rescuetime‘s part. But it’s just that. A nice gesture. Good customer service. Put down that pipe, Shaggy; it’s too early to spark that bad-boy.

What do you think?