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How TurboTax is Using Twitter to Help Customers Through Tax Season

 

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Twitter is a great tool to help achieve a number of business and marketing goals, whether they be promoting content, connecting with prospects or building relationships with other thought leaders and industry experts.  However, there is one Twitter use I think many may overlook -- the opportunity to facilitate customer support. 

In an effort to streamline customer support throughout the upcoming tax season, popular online tax software TurboTax is launching a new initiative to help its customers (and other taxpayers) through the daunting process of paying taxes by answering questions on -- you guessed it -- Twitter! 

 

TeamTurboTax on Twitter

As of yesterday, TurboTax has created a new Twitter account, @TeamTurboTax, specifically devoted to the new initiative and enlisted 14 of its employees to answer people's software and general tax questions.  Similarly, TurboTax has also created a TurboChat application on its Facebook page for the very same purpose. 

Why it works for marketing and PR:

In my opinion, this is brilliant!  I love seeing companies using Twitter as more than just an endless feed to promote their content, and as a public relations professional, using social media for customer relations and customer support completely makes sense.  Here are a few reasons why:

  1. TurboTax is going where its customer already are.  Rather than making them sign up for another support website or using a separate chat service, TurboTax is giving its customers the opportunity to communicate using an application they may already be signed up for.
  2. It's timely.  Tax season is without a doubt a busy time for a company like TurboTax.  Eliciting other tools such as social media sites to manage the influx of customer support issues is smart.
  3. It's public.  TurboTax is taking something that is usually a one-on-one, customer-to-support process out in the open for the world to see.  Take a look at the TeamTurboTax feed and anyone can see how well they're handling customer issues.  Done right, and this can be great for TurboTax's PR efforts.
  4. It exhibits industry expertise to non-customers.  Not only is TurboTax answering questions from their software's customers but also from non-customers. Answering general tax questions shows their tax paying expertise and possibly attracts new customers to its software.

So now one question remains.  Are you taking advantage of Twitter to interact with and support your customers?  If not, start brainstorming ways you can utilize the tool to benefit your customer service efforts!

 

Webinar: Twitter for Marketing and PR



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Want to learn more about using Twitter for Marketing and PR?

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Posted by Pamela Seiple on Tue, Feb 02, 2010 @ 12:46 PM

COMMENTS

TurboTax gets it - last year they even had special google ads with Twitter feeds showing TurboTax tweets.  
 
This year when I filed my taxes with them (somehow managed to do that early this year) when I was done they had a "share this on Facebook" button to let your Faceboook friends know you filed your taxes and that you did it with TurboTax. 
 
I didn't use the Facebook button share button (I'm just content to share that fact in HubSpot blog comments), but it shows that TurboTax is definitely thinking forward on their marketing opportunities!

posted on Tuesday, February 02, 2010 at 2:14 PM by Walter Elly


Twitter is such a versatile medium, we've seen many companies successfully using it as a customer service tool. Should Turbo Tax have a designated Customer Service account and then a general account for more general updates? Or keep it all under one roof?

posted on Tuesday, February 02, 2010 at 2:15 PM by Chris Getman


Dear Mr. Shah, 
 
My name is Chaoqun (Charles) Xiang, I am a Marketing Communication student in Stuart School of Business, Illinois Institute of Technology, and serve as President of a student organization called Stuart Marketing Association. 
 
Recently I've read some of your articles on Hubspot's website, which I think it's a great place for resources.(I first knew Hubspot from BMA breakfast in which your Marketing VP Mr. Volpe gave us a wonderful presentation on inbound marketing). Your blog is WONDERFUL!  
 
After reading your blog, I started thinking that it would be great if we can have some marketing gurus like you to give our marketing students a speech. So I am writing to invite you to come to our school, which located at 565 W. Adams St., to give us a talk. Would you be willing to share your expertise with us?  
 
Actually as part of the plan for this semester, we are inviting a series of guest speakers from marketing industry to give speeches on different aspects of marketing communications so that we can get a sense of what's going on in the real world outside of academic learning. It would be great if you can share with us the role of blogs in marketing. 
 
I look forward to hearing from you!  
 
Yours, 
 
Chaoqun (Charles) Xiang 
 
President 
Stuart Marketing Association 
Stuart School of Business 
Illinois Institute of Technology 
 
Cell: 312 532 9428

posted on Tuesday, February 02, 2010 at 4:46 PM by Chaoqun Xiang


It's the old adage, for business and life in general: you have to give to get. Turbo Tax is very smart.

posted on Wednesday, February 03, 2010 at 11:34 AM by Merryl Rosenthal


I'm Christine from TurboTax. Thanks for the kind blog post and comments. We've got a big cross-functional team of folks who work really hard over here to make our social efforts come to fruition -they're going to be pretty excited to see this post. 
 
Walter, I think you had my favorite comment (This may go on my wall) "TurboTax gets it." Is it wrong to be excited about that one? (B/c I am!) 
 
For the record, we're also interested in comments with suggestions for improvement.  
 
Thanks again for the nice post, 
Christine Morrison, TurboTax Social Media Marketing Manager 
 

posted on Wednesday, February 03, 2010 at 2:20 PM by Christine Morrison


Christine, does saying you could actually pay our taxes count as a suggestion? 
 
Just kidding. Thanks for setting a good example for other companies.

posted on Wednesday, February 03, 2010 at 2:48 PM by merrylrosenthal


Merryl, you are not kidding! I would be the first in line for that program.  
-Christine

posted on Wednesday, February 03, 2010 at 4:58 PM by Christine Morrison


Great post, for both letting us know how TurboTax is using Twitter and the many reasons of why it's a great idea.  
 
As a marketing professional who specializes in LinkedIn, I appreciate a blog posting streteching my knowledge of other social media, that helps me answer client questions such as "Why Twitter?"

posted on Thursday, February 04, 2010 at 5:28 AM by Andrea Dale


Comments have been closed for this article.