Managing Your Social Media Customers
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Companies, large and small, are tirelessly attempting to corral and engage new customers via social media websites. However, company-wide commitments to attract happy and satisfied customers can often generate the opposite result.
This is not surprising. Human employees must interact with your customers, regardless of your company’s electronic sophistication. Senior management must accept this eventuality and establish a plan to correct errors and manage your social media and most vocal customers to keep them engaged.
Along with human mistakes, you will also face technical problems, usually at all the wrong times (Murphy’s Law?). Senior executives must have a workable plan in place that outlines effective, useful responses.
Should you neglect to implement a “social media customer management” program, the combined negative voice of your now-formerly engaged customer base may retaliate quickly and wreak devastation on your company.
Like other useful “tools,” social media involvement can generate loyal, repeat customers. However, similar to all tools, when used improperly, they can do more harm than good. As every home handyman knows, even a simple hammer, used carelessly, will inflict serious pain instead of helping the user complete a good job.
For example, larger companies typically use a variety of HR tools to identify and hire the best candidates available for open positions. However, when these otherwise effective HR tools are employed incorrectly or haphazardly, the result is decreased performance and increased turnover.
As always, stay focused, diligent, in tune, and responsive to your customers’ wants and needs. When mistakes or glitches happen, respond quickly, tastefully, dutifully, respectfully, and--fix the problem.
Author Daniel Ziv, writing for destinationCRM.com, faced this issue and offered some wise suggestions in his article, “The Social Customer Strikes Back” (December 2011). Consider these tips to help manage your social media customers successfully, keeping your company’s image and brand strong.
Managing Social Media Customers
Stay proactive when negative issues occur. When problems occur, as they inevitably will, take the lead in correcting the issue(s). Never retreat into victim status. Typically, customer service glitches are the cause of negative issues and problems. First, accept that you cannot eliminate some level of customer dissatisfaction with products, pricing or perceived poor treatment by your company. Second, commit to addressing and correcting the source of dissatisfaction immediately and by all reasonable means.
Do not implement sudden product pricing increases. The recent disaster with an Internet movie subscription service caused by implementing sudden, non-publicized price increases should teach senior management in all industries a valuable lesson. Not only did formerly loyal customers cancel their subscriptions just as suddenly, but they responded quickly and savagely via social media sites. Consider price increases carefully, BEFORE implementation. You could also request suggestions from a “panel” of your current, engaged customers. Best case: Your customer base may have some insight or suggestions that your C-level and senior executives simply overlooked. Worst case: Your loyal customer base becomes aware of a potential price increase before it becomes a reality.
Stick with a winning logo. Successful branding has become a crucial component to operations and financial achievement. Changing your branding strategy is risky. As all seasoned executives know, employees strongly resist change. Customers, particularly if satisfied with your company, also dislike change. Instead of sitting around the C-level table deciding to discard your logo and move to a “new and improved” icon, consider the potential ramifications, most of which are negative. For example, a top retailer announced a new logo, but had to overturn their decision in a matter of days. Their loyal customers hated the change—and were quite vocal about their dislike via social media sites. The company responded through its Facebook account that it heard their customers “loud and clear” and reversed their decision. By being proactive and responsive, the company minimized the damage. While simplistic, the phrase “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” applies in these situations. If you wish to change your branding focus with a new logo, use your social media presence to ask loyal customers for ideas and feedback. This may eliminate a major problem before it occurs.
Allow your engaged customers guide you. You may already realize that your loyal followers are forgiving of honest customer service glitches. However, never take their loyalty for granted. Let their comments and suggestions be your road map and guide your decision-making. Listen to their collective “voice.” Identify trends—good and bad—before they take serious root, particularly the potentially negative issues. Give your most loyal customers a voice, using consumer and feedback “panels.” Avoid “paralysis of analysis.” When an issue arises, take corrective action immediately. Communicate and be responsive to customer concerns.
Social media customers can be most helpful—or destructive—to your company. Just as you use your social media presence to “talk” to your customers about the wonderful things happening at your company and how you will satisfy their wants, manage them equally intensely when senior management consider making less favorable decisions. Your customers will appreciate the communication and invitation to participate. You will also avoid having to issue mea culpa apologies and risk losing loyal customers.
Just as using HR tools to be proactive in finding the best new hires and decreasing turnover, use the power of social media to get important feedback from loyal customers and keep them informed. Manage your loyal customers and keep their loyalty.