Apr 27, 2009
will social media improve your customer experience?
Conversations in the media about social media are hot.
Matt Dickman said “Social media is a fad. All media will be social, ” and BAM! I’m feeling oh-so-behind-the-times. My blog is the first for us at Aveus, and I’ve been twittering for, well, not very long.
At the Web 2.0 Expo at the Moscone Center in San Francisco last week, social media thought leaders Charlene Li, Peter Kim, and Jeremiah Owyang talked about the fail whales, or barriers to social media marketing. More on how to jump in, or swim to the deeper end of the social pool.
But if you’re any kind of organization, one question is key: will social media improve your customer experience?
You already have a customer experience. It starts with your target customer, who has a problem or need you can solve well. And it’s what happens and how they feel as they act to solve their need. Your revenue and profit performance is determined by how close your organization comes to solving that need better than anyone else.
How can social media help you solve your customer’s problem? Imagine the media you choose and what you say. Social media efforts can improve your customer experience if you are able to:
- attract the right target customers AND cause those who aren’t a good fit go another way
- demonstrate (rather than tell) that you are the best choice
- connect customers to peers who will affirm their choice to buy
- stay connected to you and others about what happens and how they feel as they use your product or service
- listen and capture emerging needs
Will social media improve your customer experience? Only you can know. Social media can work for you IF you can use it to clearly strengthen – or speed – what happens and how customers feel on the way to a solved need.
Social media also offers a great opportunity for companies to listen to what their customers are saying. Recently, I twittered that a new Healthy Choice meal must have been good – someone stole mine from the office freezer before I could try it! Imagine my delight when Healthy Choice responded with sympathy and directed me to a link with a free coupon within the hour.
I work for a non-profit, and we were recently told by a social media expert that we should devote an hour a day working on our social media sites. At first I was skeptical, however, once I started to use Facebook as a means to promote concerts at the theater I operate, it’s become an effective tool.
It has improved our customer experience because we are able to establish a connection with patrons before they enter our theater’s doors.
I also rely on recommendations from my Facebook friends about significant news in the arts community, and I am developing perceptions about organizations by the friends they keep.
Learning how to utilize social media effectively is like learning a language. It’s frustrating at first, and then slowly one is able to understand its power as a communications tool.
Social media is just another interaction channel in the ever-expanding array of customer experiences. It is obviously in the spotlight right now and at the top of its hype cycle (for an interesting viewpoint read the latest post from Michael Maoz of Gartner here: http://blogs.gartner.com/michael_maoz/2009/05/07/why-your-twitter-and-social-crm-efforts-will-fail/). Some companies will adapt to it better than others and incorporate it into their “voice of the customer” programs. The bigger issue is that social networks (as are popular blogs) can damage or enhance your brand in ways that were harder to do before. Smart companies should definitely pay attention and keep track of their brand reputation across all media outlets, including social media networks.
ClickFox, Your point that “social networks (as are popular blogs) can damage or enhance your brand in ways that were harder to do before” is a powerful one. Social media is instant and potent.. And I suspect you, Micheal Maoz and I might all agree with the old adage that you shouldn’t ask a question if you don’t want to hear the answer. In other words, don’t enage in social media if you don’t incorporate what you hear and learn into actions that continually improve your cusotmer experience. Thanks for the comment!
Linda – Thanks for further stimulating the SM and customer service discussion.
You make a good point that companies should give thought to whether participating SM initiatives make sense for a company. It all comes back to ROI — and with social media, a large of what will drive the ongoing investment cost is related to salaries.
Part of what companies need to realize, though, is their customers are out there participating in SM whether they are or not. And to ClickFox’s point, the results of SM can be pretty immediate and in some cases, far reaching.
As to Moaz’s observations on SM failures….It seems to me it all comes down to customer-centricity. Companies that pay attention to customers (and find the right balance with cost to service) are going to seek out the right social media to interact. And although today’s Web 2.0 focuses on online media, phone calls and emails are another form of legitimate social media.
Companies that fail to pay attention and listen to customers will fail at worst or achieve lower profits, at best, than they might if they partnered with their customers.
So to me, the question isn’t whether a company should be customer centric but how. And the answer to how is driven by your customers. Via what formats do they want to be served. Ask them and observe them. They’ll guide companies to where they should be.
Kathy, I like that you start with ROI as the outcome of SM efforts – and end by noting that a focus on the customer must be the driver of such choices. I often use a line of falling dominos as an analogy to illustrate that point: If a company uses a clearly defined picture how it can solve a need, problem or desire for a carefully chosen target customer, than choices like “how much social media & how fast” become easier and you make more money.
This could be the key to the excellent “HOW to be customer centric” question you pose. If I’m 24 and trying to find a job the SM choices Monster.com makes will be different than what Microsoft might do if I’m a 54 year old CIO out to improve security of my company’s data. In other words, could using the need and target customer be the “customer centric” focus you suggest? Thanks for stopping by.
Good post. I do think Social Media is an element of online customer experience. However, I don’t agree with the comments here that Social Media is just another communications channel. I think it is something more. In fact, I think customers are setting up “residence” online. It has much more of a identity based, holistic quality of presence. As a result, I think the “residence” customers are setting up online is increasingly more important than their street address … and definitely more important than their landline phone number.
So I do think Social Media is one of the key elements of this new, emerging customer experience phenomenon online.
Patrick
Patrick – I love that you got us back into the shoes of the customer with your comments. And you’re right, increasing numbers of customers of all kinds are moving their center of gravity online in the social sphere. Looks like we are two of them.
I’ve noticed that depending on the need or desire I’m out to solve, social media factors differently into the experience I want to have. Demographically, who hangs out in which social community also varies (as this great resource from Kent Lewis shows) So if you’re making social media choices on behalf of an organization out for profitable growth – keeping that target customer and experience in mind will help. Thanks for stopping by and sharing some good thinking. Any more ideas?