Southwest has success with tweets

Several members of Christi McNeill's family have worked for Southwest Airlines, and five years ago, she sought to continue that tradition when she applied with the company to be a flight attendant.

Instead, she was hired as a public relations representative, and soon she became part of the company's broad social media strategy. Today, the Texas native heads up the company's communications via its Twitter feed.

"I never thought I'd be doing this as a career," she said. "But now, instead of shaping a message into a press release, I shape it into 140 characters."

Southwest, which has more than a million followers on Twitter, has achieved success in social media marketing with its disciplined but informal approach.

Southwest encourages employees with demonstrated writing skills to do their own Twitter feeds and those posts are often re-tweeted to the airlines' followers, she said. The company also has established a strict policy on what is and what is not appropriate to post, she said.

It's not an exact science, but Facebook fans and Twitter followers don't want to be "spammed" with posts by the information sources they follow, she said. So Southwest holds its posts to just a few a day.

"We're trying to limit it to what really matters," she said. "We don't want our messages to be overlooked. We want it to resonate with our customers and fans."

Much of the rest of the job is dedicated to doggedly watching how the Southwest brand is discussed on other Facebook and Twitter posts, as well as in blogs. The group then reacts accordingly.

The four-member customer service team is dedicated to addressing complaints and assuaging concerns while the public relations team makes certain that nothing online sullies the airline's storied brand.

"Our team is very nimble," she said.