How do Indian IT companies fare on microblogging (read, Twitter)? Terribly, I’d say. Of the Top 10 companies (as per this Rediff list), only 3 companies actually own their twitter profiles. The rest either do not even have a profile or have allowed unrelated strangers to own their profiles. Its baffling to see top IT companies not taking their microblogging (read Twitter, again!) profile seriously and have fallen prey to twittersquatters. More on twittersquatting and twitterspoofing at the end of this post.

(Note: All Twitter handles mentioned need to be tried with a http://twitter.com/ prefix. Have not included the prefix for all twitter handles below, since most of them do not exist)

TCS
tata, tataconsultancy are mere placeholders, while tataconsultancyservices doesn’t even exist! tcs belongs to ‘The Creation Shop’ and has one update as of today. It also has, for some strange reason, 47 followers! TCS draws a complete blank!

Wipro
Wow! An official twitter profile with a custom background and the logo! 59 followers as of today, but limited updates (25 so far) – strange for a twitter profile who’s first post was on April 15, 2008. Zero engagement here, but. The twitter stream is treated as just another place where boring corporate updates are posted.

Infosys
Yes, there is an official profile complete with a logo. And for someone who has started just on September 26th, they have 104 updates! 76 followers and following World Economic Forum and surprise, surprise…MrTweet. Looks like someone at Infy is pretty clued in to new twitter updates! Unfortunately, most tweets link to Infy’s corporate website or corporate blog…not a single outside link. That pretty much shows the amount of interest twitter generates within their marketing/ corporate communication team! Interestingly, the twitter handle, infy, has protected updates and the older logo of the company. Doesn’t seem even a bit official but has 132 followers!

Satyam
satyam is a placeholder – can’t even say if its official!

HCL Technologies
hcl and hcltechnologies…again, a placeholder. Doesn’t look official.

Tech Mahindra
techmahindra doesn’t even exist!

Patni Computer Systems
patni doesn’t exist. pcs belongs to pam santos!

i-flex Solutions
iflex, i-flex and iflexsolutions do not exist!

Mphasis
mphasis does not exist.

L&T Infotech
l&t and l&tinfotech do not exist.

Others

mindtree belongs to Philip Greenwood! While I havent bothered trying a few other known IT companies, it is amusing to see that cisco and novell handles are not owned by the respective companies and are languishing at the hands of completely irrelevant individuals!

It’s plain baffling. After the recent Exxon twitterspoofing issue, where a certain ‘janet’ was found to be using Exxon’s logo and tweeting on behalf of the company without any connection to Exxon, its baffling to see leading Indian IT companies treating such a popular and powerful mode of communication so callously. Who knows…this post can actually give a few twittersquatters some juicy ideas. And worse, just imagine the amount of hyper-interesting things an IT company can achieve with twitter! For starters, it can be a really powerful tool in employee communications! Imagine an official twitter feed for all employees at TCS…or group them by industry practice. Share updates on what is happening in each team…if they’re bothered about privacy, make it a private group!

What are these companies waiting for?

Picture courtesy: Twitter.com