????微博界對美國聯合航空公司（United Airlines）并非全然是友善的。2011年，在美國九家主要航空公司中，美聯航在社交媒體上的口碑是最差的，Twitter上關于美聯航的負面微博差不多有5.5萬條。禍不單行，今年春天美聯航與大陸航空（Continental）的訂票系統合并后故障不斷，許多打電話訂不到票的顧客轉而在Twitter上發牢騷，短短幾小時內，他們就發出了幾百條憤怒聲討美聯航的微博。

????面臨來自社交網絡的巨大壓力時，無論是一家航空公司也好，或是任何其他公司也罷，他們應該如何應對？如今社交媒體已不僅僅是讓企業與顧客直接聯系的一種新鮮的方式，它往往也會消費大量的營銷和客服資源。社交網站輿論的數量如此龐大，足以令人抓狂。戴爾公司（Dell）的社交媒體傾聽控制中心（Social Media Listening Command Center）就是一支專門負責傾聽社交媒體聲音的團隊。它由70余名專家組成，每天大約要追蹤25,000多條與戴爾公司有關的微博。

????每天光是要閱讀這么多信息就是一件不切實際的事，更不用說逐條回復了。因此越來越多的公司正在采取一種對策，應付日益繁重的工作量。對于某些從事這一領域的人來說，這種對策不啻于對社交網絡的一種褻瀆——可以說，這些公司正在抽離社交媒體中的“社交”部分。

????這些公司正在通過一些自動化工具來捕捉和分析社交網絡上的談話，優先篩選出那些值得關注的消息。比如某些自動規劃應用和內容優化應用可以通過追蹤大多數粉絲以及熱門話題來評估企業該在什么時候發布關于哪些內容的微博，有些公司甚至在Twitter和Facebook上部署了虛擬代理人和先進的“微博機器人”，自動回復消費者的咨詢和評論。

????咨詢公司Altimeter集團的社交媒體分析師耶利米?歐陽指出：“這個領域仍處在初期階段，但是正在成長。它的優點很明顯：各大品牌必須能夠擴大對社交網絡的研究范圍。有些企業使用社交網絡的顧客人數正在增長，這些企業也不想忽視自己的顧客。”

????不過，這種做法的缺點也很明顯。社交媒體之所以如此重要，正是由于社交媒體依托于真實的人際互動。社交網絡出現之前，消費者和企業的社區經理往往都是通過傳統的“聯系表格”和“自動求助欄”等工具進行互動。Facebook和Twitter出現之后，至少在一開始的時候，它們令消費者和企業可以在一個公共論壇中進行溝通，而且往往可以獲得幾乎是即時的溝通結果。不過耶利米?歐陽近日在科技博客Mashable的一篇文章中警告稱，一旦這個溝通渠道失去了真實性，它們可能會褪變成“另一個過度品牌化的企業媒體”，失去最初的吸引力。

????因此，擺在我們面前的問題變成了：有沒有辦法能在不失去真人溝通的前提下實現“微博自動化”？

????或許有。有一個領域的自動化技術已經取得了顯著進展，這個領域就是信息收集。所謂“自動監聽技術”已經誕生好幾年了。它可以在社交網絡上自動監聽提及某一特定內容的微博或某些特定關鍵詞，甚至可以追蹤發出消息的地理位置。廣告公司經常采用這種技術在社交網絡上收集提及客戶的貼子或微博，然后根據重要性對它們進行分類。這種新一代的信息分類技術使企業得以過濾社交媒體上的雜音，只回復最緊急的消息。

????自動規劃技術同樣也已日臻成熟。許多企業都具備合理規劃微博和網貼并及時更新的能力，人們也并不是不知道它所帶來的好處——據營銷平臺Hubspot公司報道，合理規劃了微博等社交媒體的企業，銷售機會可以增長到原來的三倍。隨著新型智能規劃應用的出現，企業在規劃微博的過程中可以減少很多臆測的成分。這些自動規劃應用采用了先進的電腦算法，可以評估粉絲們大概會在什么時候上線，甚至可以分析他們在聊些什么，然后再即時發送微博或消息，以便實現最佳的消費者接受效果。（其中一家使用了微博自動規劃技術的社交媒體系統就是我的HootSuite公司。）耶利米?歐陽在科技博客TechCrunch的一篇文章中寫道，這種“精確狙擊”的方法可以“根據大家討論的話題來選擇發送內容的時機，在正確的時間把內容發送給正確的人。”

????這種自動優化應用受到了越來越多的“付費社交媒體”——也就是營銷微博的歡迎。由于這種品牌化的微博或貼子可以即時顯示在我們的Twitter和Facebook的消息更新里，因此不少企業都愿意為它們支付高價。2011年，各大企業花在社交網絡廣告上的總支出約為52億美元，其中一部分資金就流向了這個領域。因此，如果有一種應用能夠提前自動預測消費者對營銷微博的接受情況，它的價值是顯而易見的。就像科技博客Mashable所說的那樣：“各大品牌將開始優化發布的內容，對此內容進行分析，并將所獲得的內容轉變成社交廣告，通過Facebook的‘付費贊助內容’發送出去。”它有能力把經過優化的微博和Facebook上的貼子直接變成廣告，因此有望重塑社交廣告的形態，并將成為未來幾個月里的大新聞。

????此外還有一些工具極具科幻小說的意味。最新一代的“社交機器人”和“虛擬微博代理人”如今正在Twitter和Facebook上出現。這些工具不僅可以優化內容，甚至還可以自行編撰內容。最簡單的Twitter機器人只不過是一組計算機腳本，可以自動追蹤使用了某些特定關鍵詞的用戶。而最新的社交機器人則邁上了一個新的臺階——它們不僅可以自行參與具有說服力的會話，甚至還經常會吸引大量的粉絲。比如谷歌（Google）的產品經理格雷格?瑪拉因為構建了一個名叫@trackgirl的微博機器人，用戶們都不知道@trackgirl是個機器程序，這個“女”機器人發布了一條“腳踝扭傷了”的消息，居然就有粉絲給她留言，表示同情。

????The Twitterverse hasn't been entirely kind to United Airlines (UAL). In 2011, the company enjoyed the dubious distinction of ranking worst in social media sentiment among nine major airlines with some 55,000 negative tweets. Things only got worse this spring when United fumbled its merger with Continental's reservation system. Customers stuck in mammoth phone queues turned to Twitter to air their frustrations, registering hundreds of #onhold complaints in a matter of hours.

????In the face of this kind of collective social barrage, what's an airline -- or any company, for that matter -- to do? Social media has gone from a novel way for businesses to connect directly with customers to an often sizable drain on marketing and customer service resources. The sheer volume of social conversations can be mind-numbing. Dell's (DELL) Social Media Listening Command Center -- a crack team of more than 70 specialists headed by its own listening czar -- tracks in the range of 25,000 posts a day focused on the brand.

????Reading, let alone responding, to that many messages isn't always practical. So to keep up with the burgeoning workload, a growing number of companies are taking a step which to some in the field amounts to purest blasphemy: They're taking the social out of social media.

????These companies are turning to automated tools that capture and analyze conversations on social networks, prioritizing which messages really merit attention. They're using auto-schedule and content optimizing apps to assess when and what to post, with an eye toward reaching the most followers while piggybacking on trending topics. In some cases, they're even deploying virtual agents and sophisticated bots in Facebook (FB) and Twitter streams to automatically respond to consumers' queries and comments.

????"The space is nascent but growing," notes social media analyst Jeremiah Owyang of Altimeter Group. "The upsides are obvious: Brands must be able to scale and those that are experiencing an increase in customers using social channels don't want to leave customers behind."

????The downsides, however, are also obvious. Social media's cachet is contingent on real human interaction. In the beginning, at least, Facebook and Twitter enabled consumers and community managers to knife through contact forms and automated help lines, connecting with real people in a public forum and often getting near-immediate results. When authenticity leaves the room, Owyang warns in a recent Mashable article, these channels may become "yet another over-branded corporate medium," losing their primary appeal.

????The question becomes, then, are there ways to automate without losing the human touch?

????Maybe. One area where automation has already made significant inroads is information gathering. Automated listening technology to monitor mentions, specific keywords and even geographic origin of messages on social platforms has in fact been around for years, used by ad agencies to track references to clients and in similar roles. What's new and interesting in this space, however, are tools that intelligently screen these conversations and categorize them based on importance. This next-generation triage technology lets companies cut through the noise on social channels and respond to only the most urgent messages.

????Scheduling is likewise ripe for automation. The ability to schedule tweets, posts and updates in advance is hardly novel (Nor are benefits unknown: Companies that schedule yield three times as many leads, according to marketing platform Hubspot). New smart scheduling apps, however, aspire to take some of the guesswork out of the process. Using algorithms that assess when followers are likely to be online and even what they're talking about, tools send out timed messages for optimum reception (Disclosure: One of the social media systems using this auto-scheduling technology is my company, HootSuite). This sniper-like approach promises to "match what's being said and time content to publish at the right time to the right people," writes analyst Owyang in TechCrunch.

????Importantly, this kind of auto-optimized content lends itself well to the emerging world of paid social media, i.e. "promoted" stories and tweets. Companies pay dearly for these branded updates injected right into our Twitter and Facebook streams -- part of an estimated $5.2 billion spent on social advertising in 2011 -- so a tool to automatically forecast reception in advance has obvious value. As explained on Mashable, "Brands will start with content publishing optimization, analyze this content and re-purpose earned content into social ads ala Facebook's sponsored stories." This potential to turn optimized tweets and Facebook posts directly into ads promises to remake social advertising and will be significant news in the months ahead.

????Then there's the sci-fi stuff: the latest generation of social bots and virtual agents showing up on Twitter and Facebook. These tools don't just optimize content; they make it. In their simplest incarnation, Twitter bots are computerized scripts that automatically follow users who use certain keywords. The newest social bots, however, take this to another level -- participating in convincing conversations and often drawing legions of followers. Google (GOOG) product manager Greg Marra earned notoriety building @trackgirl, who infiltrated the ranks of hardcore runners, even attracting sympathy messages when she "hurt her ankle."