“Social listening” — the practice of brands tuning in to what customers are saying to them and about them on social media — is a hot topic, and we’ve talked a lot about the increasing importance of brand responsiveness. While many companies are working to increase and improve their ability to address consumer questions, comments, and concerns via networks like Twitter, some brands are already way ahead of the pack when it comes to engaging their digital followers, and have made great strides of late.

According to Socialbakers, which has been measuring brand responsiveness on Twitter since the fourth quarter of 2012, companies in the finance, airline, and telecom industries dominate the Twitterverse with respect to effective and quick responses (we wonder if this has anything to do with the fact that these industries often make us want to tear our hair out, and therefore have much to gain by providing excellent customer care). While the latest stats prove that these businesses continue to lead the charge, some under-performing industries like retail have recently shown notable improvement.

In fact, every industry studied has shown at least some improvement in their Twitter response rates, demonstrating that brands are recognizing the importance of social media interactions.

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Ever feel like you’re living in The Truman Show and every ad you see is geared directly at you? While we know that this is becoming more and more true with targeted online ads, it still never fails to freak me out when I am merrily going about my business, and suddenly the promoted tweet at the top of my feed is for something I desperately need at that very moment.

As a lifelong migraine-sufferer, a recent tweet from Excedrin had me looking over my shoulder for the candid camera.

Knowing I had a headache coming on, I decided to get all of my computer-related work out of the way. When I logged into Twitter, the first thing I saw was this:

Vote for “Who Deserves Excedrin the Most?” Sweepstakes on Facebook and enter to win great prizes. Rules apply. #WDETM on.fb.me/YkP8hD

— Excedrin® (@Excedrin) April 17, 2013

“Me,” I thought, “done deal.” But then, in my migraine-induced half-conscious brain fog, I began to over-analyze Excedrin’s question. Why vote for who is most deserving? Sweet merciful heaven, is there a shortage and this is their way of rationing? Or, even worse, is this some sort of Joker-style social experiment to expose the dark underbelly of our society that would label certain people undeserving of pain relief? Fortunately, it was at this point that the rational, as-of-yet-unaffected-by-migraine part of my brain told me it was time to go to bed. 

Once I had emerged from my twelve-hour headache hibernation, I decided to check out (with a clear mind) how migraines could be made into a sweepstakes. Read more

Why, for the love of all that is decent, human, and empathetic, haven’t brands figured out that it is never okay to exploit a tragedy that irreversibly altered and ended human lives?

In the hot seat for today’s installment of who the hell let this company near a Twitter feed, is food website Epicurious. In the wake of the horrific events at Monday’s Boston Marathon, the company tweeted this to its 385,000 followers:

As a lifetime Massachusetts resident, I was particularly appalled and offended by this gross, clumsy, and unfathomably insensitive attempt at self-promotion. The suggestion that a recipe for cranberry scones or a bowl of cereal could somehow alleviate the sense of fear and loss that swept Boston, Massachusetts, and the country after the explosions would be laughable if it weren’t so terrible.

And then, instead of making real, human apologies or taking any meaningful steps to backtrack or make up for their offense, Epicurious chose to simply tweet the same cookie-cutter mea culpa over and over again: Read more

You’d think former President Bill Clinton, master of shameless self-promotion, would know all about hyping himself on Twitter, right? Apparently not! In his famous state of perpetual insecurity, Clinton asks Stephen Colbert, “What if you tweet and nobody tweets back?”

Colbert isn’t just a genius when it comes to self-promotion: he knows how to win attention for other people, too. On last night’s show he didn’t just advise Clinton to start tweeting — he had an account ready!

Fast Company calls this a “giant guerilla marketing stunt”. 83,000 followers on the strength of a single tweet? We might just have to agree. Somebody name this man Pope already! (Not really.)

Just spent amazing time with Colbert!Is he sane? He is cool! #cgiu

— Billy Jeff Clinton (@PrezBillyJeff) April 6, 2013

Oh, and the feed’s bio reads: “I am President William Jefferson Billy Jeff Rodham Clinton. Stephen Colbert is my BFF.” We greatly admire Colbert’s unparalleled ability to make everything all about himself, but most importantly we hope that @PrezBillyJeff follows our 7 hashtag strategy tips. If a tweet falls in the forest…

A Target shopper recently noticed that the color of a grey plus-size dress was listed on the store’s website as “Manatee Grey” (and the image of a manatee may not be the most flattering one to conjure up when trying to sell clothing). To be fair, manatees are, in fact, grey — so while this incident certainly doesn’t demonstrate marketing genius, it’s not necessarily a major issue. The thing is, said shopper also noticed that same dress in regular sizes was listed as “Dark Heather Grey.” Aaaaand now we’ve got a problem.

Would-be Target customer Susan Clemens voiced her disgust on Twitter:

What the. Plus sized women get “Manatee Grey” while standard sizes are “Dark Heather Grey.” @target #notbuyingit twitter.com/suZen/status/3…

— Susan Clemens (@suZen) April 3, 2013

To Target’s credit, the retailer’s response was swift and appropriate:

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If you haven’t seen the photo to the left, it’s a safe bet you haven’t been on Facebook in the past 24 hours.

The Human Rights Campaign’s drive for marriage equality has taken social media by storm as the Supreme Court hears arguments in the Proposition 8 case. The social campaign launched around 1 p.m. EST Monday afternoon, when the organization changed its Facebook profile picture to the logo at left.

So what was this all about? “Red is a symbol for love, and that’s what marriage is all about,” HRC spokesperson Charlie Joughin told MSNBC.com on Tuesday. “We wanted to give people an opportunity to show their support for marriage equality in a public and visible way.”

Even if you failed to log into Facebook, celebrities and politicians alike made sure their Twitter followers knew all about the campaign:

Use this photo for your profile pics this week in support of marriage equality during these very… instagram.com/p/XVCe0XRsXT/

— Lance Bass (@LanceBass) March 26, 2013

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We recently told you about the success of Hot Wheels’ tweet-powered vending machine, and speculated as to what sort of real-world device would be powered by customers’ tweets next, but even we hadn’t thought of this…

To kick off its first ever global ad campaign “For the Bold”, Doritos has taken the concept to the next level (or maybe even the level beyond that) by building a 62-foot-tall, tweet-powered concert stage designed to look like a giant vending machine at SXSW.

The high-tech platform will take tweets featuring the hastag #BoldStage and use them as real-time concert controls. This means that viewers can harness their unprecedented power to choose the show’s opening act, handpick the set list, control the special effects, and send pictures of themselves rocking out directly to the four-story screen in the arena (all with only a 9.6-second lag time).

Sounds a little crazy, no?

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We know that social media can power all sorts of things from brand recognition to customer interaction, and that making it worthwhile for customers to use your hashtags by offering prizes or incentives can sometimes prove a useful strategy — but what about using tweets as actual (not just digital) currency to literally power a customer vending machine?

That’s exactly what Hot Wheels and Chevrolet Canada teamed up with Canadian agency TrojanOne to create: a vending machine that accepts tweets rather than coins and dispenses limited-edition diecast toy car collectables rather than chips and soda. The companies built the customized vending machine (which was just a regular coil vending machine updated with special web-enabled computer components) in honor of the Toronto Auto Show. All toy car enthusiasts had to do was stand near the machine, enable location features on their smartphones and tweet at @HotWheelsCanada using the hashtag #ChevyCIAS. Ta da! A free toy car.

The machine dispensed about 2,000 of them over the 10 days of the auto show. Impressive, no?

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For all the time, money and man power spent planning and perfecting Super Bowl ads, one of the most successful and brilliant acts of branding that occurred during last night’s game went from idea to execution in a matter of minutes–and cost a whole lots less than any prime time TV spot.

Oreo tweeted the below message at 8:48 pm last night, just after the power went out in half of the Mercedes-Benz Superdome. As of this writing, Oreo’s comical, lightning-speed advert has been retweeted over 14,000 times.

Power out? No problem. twitter.com/Oreo/status/29…

— Oreo Cookie (@Oreo) February 4, 2013

So in a world of meticulously crafted, edited and reviewed Super Bowl advertising (like Oreo’s TV spot), how did the brand manage to get its incredibly topical message into the Twitterverse so quickly? Sarah Hofstetter, president of 360i–the agency behind the ad–explained, “We had a mission control set up at our office with the brand and 360i, and when the blackout happened, the team looked at it as an opportunity…Because the brand team was there, it was easy to get approvals and get it up in minutes.”

Other brands quickly followed suit with their own blackout-themed tweets, but none received the response that Oreo’s did.

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While regular commuters use New York City’s (in)famous subway system to get to work, the rich and the famous often use the subway when working in a public relations capacity.

For example: Jay-Z took the R Train to his own show at Brooklyn’s Barclays Center (a.k.a. Chez Jay-Z), and now Google co-founder Sergey Brin has been spotted on the 3 train sporting Google Glasses, which are basically the Internet on your eyes. Are they “everymen” now? Of course not. But we love them for it.

Though the public often has a complicated relationship with fame, we appreciate it when members of the more glamorous classes do “regular people” stuff like riding public transportation. Savvy PR professionals know that with the limitless social media platforms and digital devices out there, it doesn’t take long for someone famous on the subway to end up trending on Twitter. That’s valuable publicity for a mere $2.25.

Taking the subway demonstrates a connection with the public and the realities of our lives. Even star-struck commuters don’t reach for a pen and paper and ask, “Can I have your autograph?” They ask, “What are YOU doing on the subway?”

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