Twitter is allowing brands to provide higher levels of customer service over the platform with the implementation of two new tools for direct messages and customer feedback.

The move is good news for brands, as millions of customer service-related interactions occur on the platform every month. For brands on the platform, up to 80% of the inbound social customer service requests take place over the platform.

The new direct message feature allows businesses to add a link to their tweets displaying a call to action button that allows the customer to send the business a direct message.

The current format is often clunky and offers little in the way of flexibility in terms of customer interaction. Businesses field numerous customer service inquiries per day on Twitter, however sometimes private information such as residential and email addresses, phone numbers and transaction numbers are required to resolve an issue or field an inquiry adequately.

The new direct message feature offers greater flexibility and eliminates the unnecessary complication around customer service interactions, allowing customers to seamlessly switch to private messaging during an interaction and provide details they might not necessarily have been comfortable doing publicly.

Twitter is also rolling out a customer feedback system to accompany the direct message feature. The new feature will allow customers to privately share their opinions of the business at the conclusion of the service interaction.

The function will allow customers to rate the company out of 10, then provide a brief explanation for their decision.

The customer service feature will use two industry standard question formats: Net Promoter Score (NPS) and Customer Satisfaction (CSAT).

The direct message feature is now available for businesses to begin using immediately, however the customer feedback component will be gradually rolled out to a select group of businesses over the coming weeks.