Customer service has always been an important facet of social media. With increased use of social media platforms in the past year due to COVID-19, it has become even more important. One of the faster platforms for customer interaction is Twitter. 

To help brands learn what Twitter users want from their customer service Tweets, the platform surveyed users in the US and UK. Here are five recommendations from that survey:

• Reserve a support handle for customer service use. Twitter’s survey found that 64% of respondents believed that a dedicated support handle showed more of a commitment to customers. As an example, Twitter’s support handle is @TwitterSupport.
• Be sure to promote the support handle. It’s one thing to have a support handle, but it’s not doing much good if no one knows about it.
• Fast response is key. People expect quick responses on Twitter. Brands should have people dedicated to Twitter responses that are fast and consistent with the brand’s guidelines and policies.
• Sound like a human when you reply. Almost half of the survey respondents (45%) said that a human-sounding response is important.
• Follow the user’s lead in responding on Twitter. If the user sends a DM, respond by DM. If they reach out via a public Tweet, respond to their Tweet. If you feel the conversation needs to continue offline, you can request the user send a DM with more details.