escom98

I was considering setting up a microblogging service that businesses can easily install on their site and that allows direct communication with the business owner and the client. (The installation makes a small button appear in the corner of the browser window when someone open's that business' website. Clicking on this button opens a small window with a microblog. clients can ask questions, leave feedback, etc. and business owners can respond either privately to that client, or publicly so that all clients who click on the button will see the answer).


The messages the business owner sends and receives can be viewed on their microblogging backoffice, providing a useful archive of customer communications. The idea is to increase interactivity on the sites that install the button and drive up sales. The service would be free.

Do you think that this type of service could be effective/successful? Do you have any ideas about how to make it better? Are you interested in helping? Any opinions/thoughts are greatly appreciated!

sourcefreelance

How would you plan to moderate it.. I might be wrong but would a microblog leave limited room for specific content? Wouldnt a business forum be easier.. Unless im mistaken!

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escom98

Thank you for your opinion, sourcefreelance! Perhaps I didn't explain the service well enough. I don't think that there's a need for moderation in the sense that you explain, since comments the user makes are either notes for the hotel manager or comments for himself. Other users will never see what he thinks about the hotel. I was afraid if we made user comments public, the service would turn into a sort-of trip advisor where everyone gives their two cents about the establishment (these reviews could be phony or vulgar and, like you point out, would need moderation).

Instead, all user comments are either private notes for themself or direct questions/requests to the hotel (only the hotel owner sees these requests, they are not public).

Comments are taggable, and so the entries will be organized into subjects in this way. I thought this would be easier than setting up a mini-forum for each hotel structure. It will also be possible to rank comments according to their importance so users can remember which comments they want to remember.

I hope I understand your comment about the microblog leaving limited space for specific content. (What do you mean exactly?) Perhaps we could add some suggestions about what to write/ask the hotels so that users have some focus. I am considering expanding the service so that it can be used on any site, not just for hotels, and so at first didn't want to limit the scope. But maybe you're right, users need some direction.

Thanks again for sharing your thoughts!

sourcefreelance

It makes sense to make it private! what i meant by specific content is how you planed on dividing the information, however you have said you would use the tags..

its a nice idea, and actually its quite possible, especially if you have a company with a larger amounts of branches.. Where the information or solutions could be shared across the database.. It would develop nicely.

I believe seimens had a similar idea concerning problem solving, a problem comes up, its put into the database, when a solutions comes up its put into the system, and then anytime the problem comes up there is a live database there for staff to refer to.. They were one of the first to come up with this idea i believe.

This however is restricted to staff for obvious reasons, however your idea is similar i believe..

What would you plan to do? Sell the software or implement and run it for them ?

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