Three Free Ideas to Make @wmata Better

From Kara:

People often say your blog doesn't offer constructive suggestions. I think they're wrong, and here's one Metro can do now, for free. I know it's not the most important thing facing Metro, but I think it would help.

Break up the Twitter feeds!

The last thing I want to see in the @wmata stream is response after response to every rider with an issue.

I'm not saying ignore riders, but put all that on another feed--@wmatacares or something. Metro is good at coming up with slogans. Maybe Mind Mixer will help---for a fee, of course.

Most of Metro's "help" on Twitter apart from updates of train locations and the reasons for delays isn't really help. Metro pretty much tell riders to contact customer service if they have a complaint.

Keep @wmata service related. That's the number one thing most people want from the Twitter feed, so don't dilute it with so much stuff 99.999 percent of stuff riders don't care about. Quantity does not equal quality.

I don't know about everyone else, but I read the @wmata feed on my cell phone for the most part. Sifting through tens of tweets between @wmata and a customer over some, mostly mundane, problem keeps me from the key information: Are there any delays?

An even more obvious thing for Metro to do would be to make another feed for buses.

Finally, and most importantly, don't sass customers! I've seen it way too many times. @wmata needs to turn the other cheek, even if a rider sasses them.

Anyway, check out @SFBART to see how social media for a mass transit system is done.

Honestly though, I'd rather Metro just work so I'd never have to check twitter about them again.

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