It’s been 3 months since United Airlines was dragged into social media. There are hundreds of social media sites a big brand could use to connect with customers. Twitter, as the real-time queen of social media, is a good place to look for evidence of social media savvy and evolution.
Here’s a current snapshot of @UnitedAirlines:
“Twanksgiving Tware” says a lot about where United is with their understanding of how Twitter works. I feel for them like I feel for the baby boomer who uses ancient surfer lingo in attempts to connect with today’s youth. It’s awkward.
And what about the page design? If United Airlines offered deals on deep-sea expeditions through their Twitter page, the gradient would make sense. The logo hesitantly bobs above the heavily-cropped portion of an airplane. If you breathe deeply, you get a hint of mothballs as you read the copy:
Thanks for following United Airlines on Twitter. We hope you will enjoy the special deals and other information that we tweet your way.
We also look forward to reading your gravel experiences, destination ideas, and more!
There’s no mention of who, “we” is, just the reminder in the sidebar that tweets are from an “official twitterer.”
Snide remarks aside, here’s how I’d bring United Airlines up to speed:
The new design follows the same color scheme of a United 747 airliner. Dark blue at the bottom with shades of blue turning into white at the top. It’s a good look for the planes and I like how it turns out on the page. It feels more like one is taking off into the air than diving into the ocean. That’s a good thing.
Here’s how it looks on a Twitter page
Thanks to Twitter’s willingness to let us play with colors, the sidebar matches the top level blue in the page design. It gives the page a bit of a frame without overworking the idea.
If we take a closer look at the information to the far left of the page we see some dramatic changes.:
- The United Airlines logo is much larger than the old one with the letters in blue to contrast against the white background. This color combination is used on some of the smaller United planes (continuity of brand is maintained).
- In a small leap of faith, I assumed that Twitter users would be aware of their surroundings. As such, the updated copy simply reads, “Thanks for following!”
- The next section gives a quick outline of what followers can expect to get from the United stream.
- In a dramatic leap from the faceless corporate drudgery of the first page, the next portion boldly states, “here to serve you” and lists the three people who contribute to the United stream. (Cotweet will automatically apply [^user initial] to tweets. There is currently just one person tweeting for UA–not enough for a real presence.)
- The final bit of text allows prospective followers to get a feel for what United is hoping to get out of interactions. It’s short and peppy, like a good tweet.
What would you add?
Seth,
Nice start. I’d actually would want them to separate their presence on twitter by region since they fly worldwide, I’d want them to cater to me as a French guy or Singaporean or ?? So either have a rep for each region as part of @unitedairlines or have @ua_asia @ua_europe etc.
Otherwise, I love the idea of making twitter a special channel where consumers would get specials/contests only there. I’d had also a way to divert “noise” such as offering links to FAQ, contact us and other “relevant” pages.
Last? a place where consumers can provide constructive feedback on service, destinations they fly etc.
Thanks William,
I think your idea of different streams for different regions would be taken care of by a more robust UA presence that quickly funneled regional Tweets to appropriate representatives if there was a problem. Otherwise, being friendly is a worldwide language.
UA does a free upgrade trivia contest that usually can be answered by searching the UA site. Good way to drive traffic to a site at least. Not sure what else it does.
The rest of your additions would involve a different way of thinking with regard to the UA site itself, not just the Twitter page. That’ll be awhile coming. =)
Thanks for your input!
Some solid and well thought out advice here Seth (as expected from your good self).
I think your correct, they do need to understand just what twitter and social media represent to both their brand and their consumers and potential clients just a little more comprehensively, but we have to give credit where credit is due, getting into this sphere is a very scary endeavour for businesses as it can open some potential PR nightmares and other related issues so actually doing it in the first place is a big step and Im sure they will eventually catch up (here is hoping for their sake).
Sticking to the point in case of your post, I think you have put more serious thought and effort into the brand than they have done themselves leaving me looking at it and thinking “this has been slapped together in 5 minutes, just to get the job done”. Maybe they will consider some of your points seriously and even adopt, after all, they make sense.
I especially like the touch of the graphic you suggested that aims to show the message, the people and the aims in a simple concise manner making use of the background real estate in a much more effective manner and reinforcing the message that has been entered into the biographical description, although it also needs some shaking up as its the usual, corporate, generic, middle of the road jargon trying to offend no one and cover all the bases, consequently, it also interests no one in particluar and serves no real purpose due to the disjointed nature of the copy.
“United Airlines; Global Airlines; Star Alliance; Public Relations; official twitterer; Hubs in Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Washington”
Something a bit more factual would serve them better in my option:
“Operating approximately 3,300 flights a day in 171 countries worldwide United Airlines are one of the longest established air travel providers in the USA and the world”
(Just an example segment I took directly from their About Us page: http://www.united.com/page/middlepage/0,6998,1276,00.html?jumpLink=%2Faboutunited)
One final point is, I have no idea why, in the name of all that’s holy and sensible, they have not added their website URL in their twitter profile or even better, created a specific twitter landing page (eg: http://www.united.com/page/twitter-welcome/) which could expand upon the message and aims of the company and introduce the other representatives and their profiles in a much more detailed manner.
Looks like they could do with some help to be honest, I wonder if we should give them a call!
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