There's one major utilization for Twitter that's often overlooked-- the social monitoring and response.
For example, I was recently in Lynnwood, WA and looking for a Thai place. Within five minutes of posting to Twitter, someone from the city of commerce actually responded with a direct suggestion.
Another example is Best Buy's "Twelpforce"
When I was working on the dealership level we would coordinate our efforts with charitable endeavors and community involvement-- but really got the best feedback and response by monitoring with tools like Google Alerts and HubSpot and responding promptly to feedback. There's a surprising amount of people that are willing to talk about when they're in, or left a dealership. With more advanced tools emerging, there's new ways to search on a local basis daily.
Otherwise, a basic step for anyone should be to set up Google Alerts and at least create a Twitter account to be able to respond to feedback for both yourself and competitors.
