How do you handle customer service complaints, especially those that come across social media? Do you have a plan for quick response or do you ignore them? Your customer service may have something closely related to the theories surrounding the contents of Area 51.

On July 4, 1947, shiny metal debris was found scattered across a ranch near Roswell, New Mexico. A ranch hand called the local sheriff’s office to report that some sort of aircraft had crashed during the night. The sheriff investigated the crash and contacted officials at the Roswell Army Airfield, the largest strategic air command of the U.S. Air Force. At first, the Air Force claimed that the scrapped metal was part of a "flying disk” that had been brought down during a thunderstorm. However, they quickly recanted when a local newspaper claimed that the flying disk was some sort of space ship carrying extraterrestrial beings. Oddly enough, just ten days prior to this incident, a pilot had reported seeing nine flying saucers moving at a high speed above Mount Ranier in Washington. The pilot, Kenneth Arnold, stated that the nine UFOs flew in a formation and were made from a shiny metal. That was all it took for UFO theories to grow legs and run.

The Air Force tried to say that the metal was all a part of a weather balloon that had crashed. UFO enthusiasts sensed a government cover up. Rumors began to circulate that there was more than metal that was recovered at the crash site. They said there were bodies of extraterrestrial beings that were found and moved to a secret holding area in the Nevada desert known as Area 51. The Air Force released a report in 1994 that claimed they had been involved in high atmospheric surveillance of Soviet nuclear testing and that one of their high altitude balloons had crashed. More cover up, retorted the UFO theorists! What about the bodies? It took the Air Force three more years to respond once again, this time with their final report "The Roswell Report, Case Closed” where they admitted to recovering bodies, but they were not extraterrestrial beings. They were dummies used to test high altitude parachutes. If it were true, surmised the skeptics, why did it take 50 years to admit it? There is not really anything classified about pushing a test dummy out of an airplane to examine the reliability of parachutes. The problem for the Air Force – or any other government agency making remarks about the Roswell incident - it had been so long since the actual events took place, nothing they could say would be accepted as truth unless they agreed with the UFO theories, even if what was being reported was 100 percent truthful.

What does all of this have to do with marketing? First of all, I would include customer service as a big part of marketing. If you want to retain customers, you have to do a very good job of customer service. A big part of customer service these days is maintaining comments on social media. It is very easy for a disgruntled customer to give you a low rating, to go on a rant of your poor service or faulty products, or to leave a disparaging remark about your company. Some companies have chosen to ignore these customer interactions. The problem is, if you don’t respond, theories of your poor service or low quality can go viral. Misery loves company. These kinds of problems need to be addressed quickly to see if there is a way to solve the customer’s problem. If someone tweets that your product is bad, you need to find out what the problem is and try to fix it for that customer. The Air Force waited 50 years to admit that they had recovered test dummies in New Mexico. By then, no one would believe their story. If they had admitted they recovered test dummies in 1947, the whole conspiracy theory might have died off rather quickly. Instead the rumor became the truth in the minds of many people.

Another problem can come about with social media. Saying the wrong thing can set problems in motion, as illustrated by the initial response by the Roswell Army Airfield officials who stated the metal was part of a flying disk. Words mean something and, in this case, "flying disk” quickly came to mean an aircraft from outer space in the minds of people in 1947. Think about what was happening in those days. Rocket science and jet propulsion were making huge advances. Talk of traveling into outer space was beginning to circulate. The Cold War was very real, with thoughts that the next World War might be fought from flying space ships in orbit around the earth. Then there was that Mount Ranier flying saucer siting just a few days earlier. If the Air Force had used another phrase other than "flying disk,” we probably would have never heard of this story. But it is hard to take something back once it goes viral. In your haste to respond to customer service issues, don’t say something you will later regret. Once you put a comment on social media, it is there forever. It is a good idea to have a plan for how to respond to customer complaints. I would suggest that your plan include calling the person after your initial response to them on social media. People are far more accusatory and aggressive on social media than they are over the phone.

If you want to keep your customer service issues out of Area 51, respond to complaints quickly, but in your haste, make sure you are saying things you will not regret later. Social media can become nasty in short order. Make sure you are neither sparking an online fight nor giving someone ammunition to castigate your thoughtless comments.