How Southwest Airlines Led With Social Media To Emerge From a Crisis

Social Media Social Hour Podcast: Social Media Marketing | Content Marketing | Facebook Marketing | Instagram Marketing

Have you wondered what happened behind the scenes of Southwest Airlines’ most recent crisis?

Are you interested in how they led their crisis strategy with social media?

On July 20th, 2016, Southwest Airlines experienced a technological outage, that resulted in chaos for their team and customers. To keep their customers in the loop, Southwest Airlines took to social media, releasing official statements through platforms like Twitter and Facebook Live.

This week on the Social Media Social Hour, I am joined by Brooks Thomas, on how Southwest Airlines led with social media to emerge from a crisis.

Let’s do this!

About the show:

The Social Media Social Hour is a podcast for marketers and entrepreneurs looking to get on the social media fast track. The podcast is an interview format, where each week I get up close and personal with top brands and influencers to talk social media, tech and online marketing. Each week I share tools that I personally use to help me with social media management, sales, marketing, accounts management, and productivity. The Social Media Social Hour is presented by Scoreboard Social.

In this episode, here is what you’ll discover:

About Brooks Thomas:

Brooks Thomas sits as an Advisor on the Social Business Team at Southwest Airlines. He is responsible for overseeing content strategy across Southwest’s social spaces and building social media training across the company. Brooks began his career in broadcast journalism, and most recently worked as the Director of Digital & Social Media at AT&T before returning to Southwest late last year.

Mentionable Quotes by Brooks Thomas:

• “Southwest was rich in story-telling long before the internet.”
• “Every seat has a story.”
• “The goal is that you’re going to get a response in under 15 minutes.”
• “Our social customer care team has over thirty people on it responding 24 hours per day, 365 days per year.”
• “The social customer care team are problem solvers. The community management team are story tellers.”
• “We don’t aspire to be executers. We aspire to be strategists and implementors of the strategy.”
• “Don’t focus on expanding your own team. Influence other teams.”
• “We were commended for our transparency and communication.”
• “We always go live with a purpose.”
• “The customer experience needs to digitize.”

Mentionable Quotes by Tyler Anderson:

• “We’re seeing brands see themselves as media outlets. They know that they need to create content.”
• “Integration is the key thing for social media.”

Items/people mentioned in the show:

• Linda Rutherford’s Systemwide Outage Blog Post
• Southwest Community Blog
• Contact Brooks Thomas:
  • Twitter –> @brooksethomas
• Contact Tyler:
  • tylerjanderson.com
  • Snapchat –> tjasnaps
  • Twitter –> @tylerjanderson

Brooks’ Social Media Six Pack:

• Favorite baseball stadium that you’ve been to? Wrigley Field
• Favorite football stadium that you’ve been to? Soldier Field
• One stadium on your bucket list? Fenway
• Favorite concert venue? Gypsy Tearoom
• Favorite food you’ve ever had at a stadium? A fancy brisket sandwich at AT&T Stadium
• Would you rather see your favorite musician in your favorite venue, attend a live sporting event at a premier location, or see live standup by your favorite comic? I would go to Wrigley to watch the Cubs in October, my favorite comedian would sing the 7th inning stretch, and my favorite musician would close it down.

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