Using HootSuite Team Collaboration tools to Increase Audience Engagement, TransLink, the transportation authority for Vancouver, Canada, successfully launched a Twitter Pilot Project to deliver reliable customer updates on events and major service disruptions.

1. Translink is the regional
transportation authority in
Vancouver, Canada and it’s
surrounding areas.
Case Study: Translink
Case Study: Translink | 1HootSuite Media Inc.
Using Team Collaboration Tools to
Increase Audience Engagement
Introduction
Translink’s overall goal for this project was ultimately to deliver better
service to its customers. In the past, the company’s Twitter account,
@translink, was a place where customers could receive up-to-the-minute
service notifications for special events (like the 2010 Winter Olympics,
held in Vancouver) or during service outages. With this new push, TransLink
wanted to build on the broadcasting success they’d seen previously by
starting to share more regular updates relevant to their followers.
The Challenge
TransLink manages several of its Twitter accounts via HootSuite, including
its main @translink account. One of the Twitter Pilot Project’s key goals
therefore was to ensure that this primary Twitter account, @translink,
would be efficiently staffed, from 6:30am to 11:30pm.
Because the @translink account was being accessed and monitored by a
number of different teams -- several customer information staff managed
it day-to-day, while the communications team members checked in from
time to time -- TransLink needed a tool that could help manage workflow
and streamline efforts.
Running on Schedule
The draft message and
scheduling features in
the HootSuite dashboard
allow teams to prepare
ahead of time for time-
sensitive and event-specific
communications.

2. HootSuite has a team of
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HootSuite Media Inc. Case Study: Translink | 2
Set up your team for
success
HootSuite team collaboration
tools enable teams with
multiple contributors to
efficiently monitor and
provide integrated support
across their social networks.
The Solution
HootSuite’s team collaboration tools enabled the teams with multiple
contributors to efficiently monitor and provide integrated support across
their social networks.
Every day, one work leader from TransLink’s Customer Information
Centre was assigned to monitor and update @translink. That individual
would be responsible for providing the rest of the teams with the latest
key customer service information and direct the way questions would be
handled. The tools used on the HootSuite dashboard for this
process included:
• Assignment tools to delegate Tweets to specific staff members at the
touch of a button and track responses
• Analytics for URLs in order to gauge what customers were interested
in and how to fine-tune messaging
• Scheduling for Tweets to provide notice about known issues and
events in advance
• Favorites to capture Tweet commendations and service successes
from customers
By using these features, the team managing @translink could see
which Tweets had been answered, who answered them, and track
how questions were being adressed. With this increased transparency
and collaboration, the team was able to stay on top of the regular
conversation about their service.
The results
Over the three months following the launch of its Twitter pilot project,
TransLinked gained an additional 3000 Twitter followers on its main
@translink Twitter account, and positioned the handle as the go-to
resource for customers looking for key, up-to-date information on their
transit services. For example, when a major snowfall delayed rapid
transit service to and from the Vancouver’s main airport and a heavily
trafficked university campus, TransLink was able to release information to
commuters quickly via @translink and saw a surge in engagement levels
through retweets, mentions and new followers on Twitter.