Want the Telstra results first? Ask Twitter
Dr Mumbo wonders if Telstra pulled off a corporate first for Australia with its results announcement today.
Telstra spokesman Peter Habib and online engagement manager Jeremy Mitchell live tweeted the whole affair, meaning the details were on Twitter before they even hit Telstra’s own website.
Habib managed to clock up more than 30 tweets during David Thodey’s briefing, with almost every one beginning with the words “CEO says…” Mitchell delivered a more modest three.
Mitchell tells Dr Mumbo: “The Twitter feeds went live before our websites – and at the same time as the ASX (which we have to do for legal reasons), it was first time we have done this and will be doing it regularly as a way of communicating and engaging in the online world.”
Kudos – great to see such corporate bravery!
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firefighters are ‘brave’ … it’s a novel initiative by telstra but let’s not go overboard.
In light of 80% of the companies (even those using it) are afraid of the implications of adopting social media and therefore do nothing as a result, this IS brave. Brave is about taking chances and doing things that others are afraid to do – so while, I agree firefighters are brave – there are many examples of bravery – so I’m not going overboard.
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I wonder what the hourly salary rate of those two is and, at a time when telstra is laying off thousands of workers, whether spending that amount to communicate to less than 300 people is worth it.
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Perhaps we can nut out a scale of bravery. What do you reckon we should give firefighters? 90/100?
Social media initiatives?
People who commission the 7PM project?
The next producer of Kyle & Jackie O.
I think we can get some decent metrics out of this…
bravery is so subjective
there’s a firefighter that enters a burning house to save a family = pretty brave
there’s an actor that agrees to star next to pauly shore in a movie = pretty brave
there’s a flight attendant that asks naomi campbell to keep quite = very brave
there’s the aspiring senior coach who agrees to do the richmond job = extremely brave
women who go out with NRL players = amazingly brave
corporate dude who twitters quarterly results = in the scheme of the above not really that brave but when compared with extremely conservative companies a little braver than the norm
A definitive scale would be tough.
I’m sure their 293 (combined) followers were very excited to get those tweets. Wouldn’t you expect the Online Engagement Manager of such a large company to have a slightly bigger Twitter profile & following?
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Jon, good point and as I have just started in this new position this week I will slowly build (I hope). So please feel free to follow. Cheers Jeremy
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women who go out with NRL players = amazingly brave? NOPE it seems for the vast majority they aren’t brave – they’re just plain stupid.
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If Telstra put a simple bit of code on their site then those tweets could be published on the Telstra website at the same time as Twitter (subject to the odd denial of service attack)…
Just like they do with Citysearch http://twitter.com/sydneysearch using Twitter as a CMS – that’s brave!
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Most listed companies haven’t even touched the surface of how to use social media for investor information yet so good to see a company like Telstra dipping its toe into this water. Over the next few years expect to see a surge in social media use for listed companies as they integrate this medium as another channel for communicating their results.
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Agree with Ben’s comments, and great suggestion by Chris. Telstra has been somewhat of a slightly conservative company in the past, but we are slowly doing more and more within the space, learning and developing as we go, and dipping our toes in the water before jumping into the (Big)pond.
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I can’t wait until the ASX makes it compulsory.
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I heard on the side that Telstra have asked Twitter to increase the 140 character limit as they are unable to report their profit for this year =)
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