Social Media - welcome to the customer revolution
Imagine a world where...
> You had access to a customer base the size of the 4th
largest population in the world
> You could reach 100 million customers in less than 9
months
> 68 million customers publicly share opinions on products and
brands daily
> 78% of customers trust peer recommendations
> Word of mouth becomes world of mouth
> Customers can give feedback anytime or anywhere
"This is the social media revolution. The world is more connected than ever before. Social media isn't a fad; it's a fundamental shift in the way we communicate. Can you afford to ignore it?" (Socialnomics, 2009)
What is Social Media?
Social media lets people communicate, chat and interact through online sites. It includes social networking sites like LinkedIn or Facebook and social bookmarking sites like Twitter. A new frontier in customer communication, social media calls out for engagement and elicits response. Ultimately, social media is not about the media. It's about the aspect which gets customers talking about something important to them and to your business. This can be great if their opinions are positive but can be incredibly damaging if not.
These days people are tweeting about anything and everything. From the taste of supermarket tomatoes to strategic Government decisions on the NHS, you name it people are talking about it.
Customer feedback in its rawest form on sites like Twitter and Facebook is gold dust to organisations. For the first time conversation that was confined to over the garden fence is now clear for all to see. Having a tool that allows you to really get under the skin of your customers has got to be a good thing. The downside of this tool however, means that if your customers are unhappy it will spread like wildfire.
With this in mind, it's surprising that a Datamonitor report says that many companies still haven't adopted a social media strategy. Managing this type of feedback effectively rather than deciding if it's worth monitoring in the first place should be the real focus.
"It's a people driven economy" (Erik Qualman, author of Socialnomics, 2009)
Are you ready?
The development in customer communication to businesses begs the question; can you really afford to ignore this wealth of customer insight and feedback?
Lacking insight into your customer base can seriously damage your brand, reputation and bottom line. Having a cleverly constructed social media strategy in place means you can achieve both customer engagement and prevent damage to your brand.
United Airlines saw their share price drop by 10% when musician, Dave Carroll wrote a song attracting over 6 million viewers on YouTube documenting his negative experience. Ignoring customer feedback through social media sites can equal reduced revenue. Looking at ways to engage and communicate positively with your customers through social media not only limits brand damage but is a clever business strategy. The focus should therefore be more about developing the right social media strategy than deciding if you should use it as a communication tool at all.
Listen first, sell later
All this is probably just the beginning of social networking. Socially connected consumers are beginning to state what they want from products and brands shifting the power away from these brands. To stay ahead of the social media game organisations need to listen to what their customers want first and then find ways of effectively communicating with them.
The Head of O2's Customer Care unit in Ireland is a firm believer in this "Turning more and more to social media to get the engagement that humanises the web. The corporate sin therefore is not to mess up from time to time, but not to listen to customers and do something about it when this happens", (Irish Times).
An effective communication strategy will embrace social media and make the best business use of it. You may wish to improve customer service, enhance awareness of products or services or boost brand perception and recognition. A good social media strategy will focus on the core message a company wants to portray and then determine the best ways to spread that core message.
Behind every good Social Media strategy...
Having the right technology in place is important when it comes to collecting customer feedback from sites. Effective technology can provide you with masses of knowledge on hot topics, new issues, where people are talking and how often you get mentioned.
Endless information can be provided from clever monitoring tools:
- Mentions of your organisation
- 'Points of view' evaluation and impact on brand
- Analysing and tracking the most active topics and conversations
- Identifying influencers, targeting and tracking
- Tagging, sorting, and segmenting posts
- Auditing e-reputation
- Analysing shifts in opinion
- Alerting you to new emerging issues
- Immediate scrutiny of public opinion in a crisis;
- Feedback on public reaction to events, product launches, and announcements
Incorporating technology into your social media strategy will give you a comprehensive sweep of the web. It allows you to understand how your customers are feeling, giving you the opportunity to react.
Social media should be used to complement a wider multichannel offering including voice, email, SMS and webchat. Social sites act as influencers, especially in relation to buying decisions. Although still in its infancy of becoming an interactive channel such as voice or email, it is predicted social media will become a major channel. Social media monitoring should be used in conjunction with a range of interactive channels to achieve a rounded service offering for customers. Tapping into this influential channel means organisations can get to the core of what their customers are saying about them and as a result enhance and protect their brand.
Join the revolution
It's clear that social networking is a powerful phenomenon: Twitter enabled the organisation of massive protests in Moldova, while Domino's Pizza staff posted a video of unsanitary methods of food preparation on YouTube.
Embracing the power of social media makes clear business sense. Implementing a clever strategy to reap the rewards from this free flow of customer insight is the important bit.
For more information on incorporating social media into your customer contact strategy contact Capita.
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