If the data is there, why don't companies listen to it?

Studies show that consumers are more inclined to be loyal to a brand if messages are more about customer service, relationship building and storytelling. This is usually the case with Twitter activity. Responding to consumer messages and relating to their interests, versus pushing another product link wins every time.

The reality is, companies are big and have tremendous layers. And the long game isn't always first and foremost around a quarterly plan. 

Until that junior/mid level manager on the brand side and/or up and coming agency strategist has the freedom and comfort level to be heard, things won't change. Data and insights are typically found by the people who are closest to the information everyday. And then those numbers are broken down and scrubbed for a higher level look.

This process may take weeks or months to pull together, analyze, scrub, insert in a presentation and handed off to someone else. Even then, a decision may not be made.

In the meantime, consumers continue to get a slew of promotional content pushed at them via multiple brands on a given day. It's not surprising to me that the general sentiment of the consumer is to be turned off by 'most' brands via social media.  A few brands are getting it right and focusing on the storytelling and relationship building with the consumer. It doesn't change the fact that consumers 'think' that the majority of messages are one sided.

Long game. This is about the long game. Either companies need to let decisions be made by those who see the data daily and/or companies need to change the way they enable non digital colleagues to dictate what is best for the social consumer.