Wiener Linien’s social media success contributes to passenger satisfaction

The Viennese love their public transport. Thirty-six percent of all trips within Austria’s capital are made by subway, tram and bus. This makes Vienna an international leader in the field of public transport – and that is certainly quite something.

Alongside having good infrastructure and modern vehicles, there is no doubt that customer focus is the most important factor for this popularity. This is also illustrated in the current customer satisfaction studies of Wiener Linien: no less than 95% of the 900 respondents surveyed evaluated the service of Wiener Linien as good – a plus of 2% compared with the previous year.

However, Wiener Linien is not resting on its laurels; not only is it trying to maintain high customer satisfaction but also to boost it even further through different means.

The launch of its social media presence in March 2011 constituted another step towards greater customer orientation and customer satisfaction, making Wiener Linien a pioneer amongst European local public transport providers.

Social media as the latest form of customer service

Over the last few years, social media has become a fixed component of business communication for an increasing number of companies to respond to society’s ever changing communi cation behaviour. Each year, 839 million passengers use public transport in Vienna. Through Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, Wiener Linien is focused on becoming even more accessible to its customers. After all, social media not only allows for the quick and direct dispersion of information to a large target group on the internet, but it also creates trust. Customers can be addressed directly and instantly which, in turn, facilitates speedy interaction between our company and our passengers.

Customer focus 2.0

With the advent of social media, we have started a new form of cutting edge customer contact. Twitter and Facebook in particular offer an additional direct channel of customer information and allow for direct communication with the users. Wiener Linien use these channels primarily to inform customers about important news, corporate information, traffic disruptions or redirections as well as about service offers. Of course, neither forgotten is the enter – tainment factor in the social web. Wiener Linien’s Facebook page features competitions or quizzes which attracts huge popularity. Prizes range from Wiener Linien goodies to on-site company visits offering a look behind the scenes of Viennese public transport – features that are otherwise hard to come by. Here the focus once again is on customer loyalty and identification with the business.

Social media is not ‘a thing on the side’

Social media does, of course, also present a challenge for a company like Wiener Linien, which carries 2.3 million people everyday: hundreds of requests, complaints and proposals as well as high-level fan discussions reach our social media team every month. In close contact with the relevant departments of our company, these questions, requests and ideas, but particularly complaints, are taken seriously and dealt with as quickly as possible. After all, in the social web opinions not only emerge but also spread very quickly. Fast, competent and empathetic communication is the key to success. More than 12,000 Wiener Linien fans on Facebook and more than 600 followers on Twitter after only six months prove our point.

Yet our social media channels also offer us opportunities to operate actively in the fields of recruitment, internal communication, employer branding, etc, and in future our staff of 8,000 plus are to receive a direct link to their business.

What is the secret of this success?

A professional social media presence requires appropriate resources and cannot be run on the side. Hastily activated social media channels without focus can quickly throw a negative light on the business. As a modern service company it was therefore clear to us right from the start that professional supervision of these channels was required for success on these platforms. This requires an efficient exchange of know-how and good networking in the company. In addition, the resources for the further development of the social media communication must also be available as social media channels develop faster than other means of communication. Close monitoring of both the technical and the communicative developments forming the backbone of these channels is required to stay up-to-date with the latest trends in this field. Although external support in strategic planning and implementation is without any doubt important for daily tasks including content creation, answering questions, finding topics and research, efficient and good contact to the various technical departments and knowledge of internal processes are also highly significant. This is why social media is best managed in-house.

Communication at eye-level

Social networks are characterised by direct communication with customers without gatekeepers, nevertheless the dialogue with the users is clearly at the foreground. Such a dialogue, however, only functions at eye-level and, above all, in a language adapted to the channels. Expert rail know-how or internal company terminology therefore takes a back seat. Our aspiration is to operate a site which is of interest for the majority of users. Users use social networks to exchange experience and information, evaluate services and products, communicate, form opinions and spread them on. Each individual can create and even define content!

As a company always focusing on the customer, for us suppressing opinions or deleting criticism on our channels is incon – ceivable! As a local transport provider in a world city, you must not only be able to tolerate criticism and feedback but also deal with it. Nonetheless, communication has to function according to the rules of the page operator. For this reason, clear discussion guidelines exist on netiquette which are pointed out each time unsuitable contributions are made. Abusive comments are deleted. Hence good moderation of the social media channels is essential. We aim to communicate honest information, good service and facts worth knowing to our users, not propaganda or advertising. In this respect, social media is also a challenge because, for exactly these reasons, it requires a certain level of openness in dialogue and disclosure of information.

No fear of criticism and unpleasant publications

Wiener Linien pursues a clear strategy in its social media presence: criticism is accepted, registered and not denied. Suggestions and ideas are welcome, taken seriously and acted upon. After all, those people who communicate with us every day on Facebook or Twitter are our customers who use our public transport on a daily basis. If errors occur they are admitted and corrections are made if necessary (e.g. if timetables published are no longer up-to-date). Wiener Linien considers constructive criticism over social media channels as an input for practical suggestions on improvement.

Unpleasant content can, of course, also find its way into the social web. However, in such a case, there is at least the opportunity to take a clear and immediate stance on the unpleasant content and put this right to clarify the matter.

Social media supplements passenger information and increases trust

Wiener Linien passengers are provided with information through all kinds of channels. Since March 2011, social media has supplemented our conventional means of customer information, such as hotlines, announcements in the stations and public transport, the website or the ‘qando’ mobile timetable information service. However, Facebook and Twitter can in no way replace these traditional means of passenger information; they can only ever be a complement. Social media is also unsuitable for comprehensive information on disruptions as it can only reach a comparatively small portion of the target group, that is to say no less than 2.3 million passengers each day. The relevance of disruptions is also very individual and cannot be adequately controlled via social media: news that concerns only a small number of people goes out to everyone, and nobody wants to be confronted with endless disruption notifications each day that does not concern their routes. Furthermore, a ‘real-time disruption service’ via social media could barely be covered in terms of resources.

Employees as another target group

Social media should also be a communicative platform for the more than 8,000 employees of Wiener Linien. The company is currently working on special guidelines for its employees so that they can use social media platforms for guidelines and support related to their own area of work at the company. Social media platforms allow employees to learn something about parts of their company that they are otherwise less involved in. In other words, a view beyond the horizon of their own department. And they have the opportunity to make active and direct contributions. The guidelines offer adequate support so that this single-level interaction also works smoothly. Previous experience shows that our employees are already very interested in Wiener Linien’s social media platforms and actively participate in discussions during their leisure time.

Social media opens up a different perspective on the company

For passengers and employees it is also exciting to see how the business they either use daily or work for presents itself on the social web. Our presence, however, is of no less relevance for recruitment and employer branding. We already receive repeated requests each month as to whether and how job applications can be submitted. Facebook, in particular, offers a new and more personal view of the business than is possible through standard job offers.

Effort that pays

Within just six months, the Wiener Linien Facebook page has attracted 12,000 fans. That is 12,000 fans that need to be attended and listened to each day. This, of course, is a big challenge requiring major work for our staff and information strategy for the communication of Wiener Linien. By the end of the day the balance, however, is very clear: great efforts pay off and have a positive effect of the company’s image. To thank our numerous fans we will soon have our own Facebook tram covered with user profile pics true to the motto: “The Facebook tram belongs to you.”

About the Author

Günter Steinbauer has been part of Wiener Linien’s Management Board since 2001 and has been its Chairman for seven years. After his studies of Civil Engineering and Construction, he started his career at Vienna’s public transport company. Mr. Steinbauer has been working for Wiener Linien for 29 years now and has played an important role in extending Vienna’s underground network.