Has yesterday’s suggestion box been replaced by today’s social media phenomenon?  A recent survey by Fleishman-Hillard and Harris Interactive suggests maybe so.

The survey, published in June of 2010, examined the opinions of Internet users in seven different countries, including the US, Canada, China, France, Germany, Japan and the UK.  One key element of the study was focused on companies that use social media to monitor their brands.

Universally, respondents reported a positive reaction to companies that rely on sites like Twitter or Facebook for customer feedback.  In the case of Chinese companies, for example, a staggering 94% of those surveyed reported a positive attitude about social media-driven brand monitoring.

The number in the US wasn’t quite as impressive, but the majority was still overwhelming, with a 72% positive response.  The lowest level of acceptance was found in the UK, where 52% of respondents replied positively when asked whether they were “glad that companies were listening and responding to my issue.”

There was a flip-side to the survey as well.  In one case (Canada) 35% of survey participants felt that companies were using social media to monitor their brands merely as a superficial, “just for show” measure.  In another instance, 22% of US respondents reported they felt that companies were “spying on them and violating their privacy.” But either way, love it or hate it, there has always been merit in evaluating customer feedback about a given brand.  And social media sites provide a handy and reliable way to do it.

For example, firms that are intent on monitoring their brands via various social media sites can now do so from one convenient location.  Thanks to a dashboard-style application developed by Avenuesocial (www.avenuesocial.com) called ManyHands, monitoring of Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and other sites can occur with one simple client login.

Now, there’s no excuse for letting customer feedback go unnoticed.

Today’s “suggestion box” may well come with a keyboard instead of a slot and a padlock.  And it’s not without its disadvantages, but it sure holds the potential to reach a lot more people and along with that, the means to increase brand awareness far beyond any traditional means of marketing.

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