Online transactions have transformed the way business is conducted all over the world. Online giants like Amazon started 20 years ago, with home deliveries and without a single physical store. Amazon operates like an agent – a platform where anyone can sell their goods, and where buyers flock to check out available products. It is now the place to go when looking to buy anything, from books to kitchenware, hardware tools toys, and so much more.
So, what makes companies like Amazon, Alibaba and any other reliable online business to thrive?
Social media has dramatically transformed businesses all over the world today. From the advent of Facebook back in 2007, followed by Twitter a couple of years later; and now we have Instagram – which is significantly transforming social media brand awareness and customer care service delivery.
Building Brand Presence on Social Media
Social media presence should be a significant part of your business strategy to maximize sales revenue and increase brand awareness. Have several branded social media accounts to showcase your products and services, and to connect with your audience through customer care, and garner more sales as a result of consistent customer engagement.
In this article, we’ll talk about ways you can maximize social media as a tool for customer service delivery.
Social media channels create a free, accessible, and relatable brand image through continuous engagement across social platforms by providing personalized customer support.
Customers trust brands that go out of their way to engage customers through the use of social engagement by providing prompt responses. By providing customer support, brands earn positive reviews, more sales, and over time, build excellent relationships by gaining loyal customers.
We have combined great Pro tips on how to use social media as a tool for customer engagement for businesses that have an online presence.
Without further ado, here’s the list.
Dedicated Customer Engagement Teams
Social platforms like Facebook are all about stories, in written form or video form. Brands leverage Facebook by creating forums where customers can ask questions and get honest reviews about a product or service they’d like to try out.
So how do you keep a thriving relationship with your brand on Facebook?
By having a dedicated team of customer care reps to send timely replies to all inquiries on your branded Facebook page.
Set limits on the number of replies for a single inquiry, or complaint and move on to calling the concerned customer for a more personalized response.
Your social media presence should radiate product confidence, and it should be aligned with your company goals.
What Time Should You Post on Social Media?
Timing is everything with social media management for customer service delivery. Your staff needs to be attentive and swift when providing customer care services on social media platforms. To effectively engage with brands, customers expect a response within thirty minutes to an hour, tops.
Convince & Convert founder Jay Baer says customers that engage brands via social media expect quick responses. Brands that understand this concept have lined up professional social media customer care reps to ensure replies are sent promptly. Keep your social media presence active with around the clock approach without compromising quality.
Spotify won a Webby Award for showcasing an exceptional social media customer care service in 2015. Their Twitter handle @SpotifyCares is entirely committed to replying to customer queries, product updates, and connecting fans with their technical support team.
Customer Engagement Tool
If you want to engage with your customers often, social media is the way to go nowadays. Big brands like Victoria Secret use social media channels for advertising their products in everyday innerwear, showcasing diverse body types. The response on their Instagram handle is amazing with dedicated teams on-call to answer every question, join in conversations and engage their customers as long as it needs to be done.
There’s always something to talk about. Personal Brands like @gabunion have gone a notch higher. They use their social media tools (Instagram) as endorsement platforms where a simple mention can boost your profile and products to unimaginable heights. Gabrielle Union enjoys over sixteen million followers on her Instagram handle, which she uses for her business engagements as well as personal adventures.
Nike plays a different ballgame with their social media customer service delivery. They give priority to their customers by responding to their social media platforms in seven different languages. They respond to every post, comment, and tweet. Their customer care service works 24/7 to accommodate all their global customers.
Turning Customer Service into Insightful Data
Social media platforms provide excellent customer service tools as money generating outlet when used correctly.
Instead of using paid survey companies and marketing expert analysts, use your branded social pages to check out the sea of insightful data on how customers engage on each of your platforms. This channel has the potential to turn your engagement into a money-making tool.
Facebook surveys, for example, deliver insightful data with real-time engagement and marketing analytics. You can utilize these metrics to gauge how well your brand receives visitors, and consumer engagement compared to your competitors by measuring consumer review analysis and tracking social metrics.
By engaging with right -social media- platform, at the right time, round the clock, you begin to understand clients’ needs and offer them what they prefer.
Overall, when using social media as your social customer service tool, make sure your efforts are aligned with customer’s needs and desires so that you can build a strong, reliable social media strategy. This approach should go with your marketing department business goals to gain a dominant brand in the social media space.
When you do this, you will automatically create an organic relationship between the brand and your online customers.
Conclusion
Using social media as a customer service tool requires a strategic approach to make it a success. For small businesses, you can hire a social media expert to handle all your customer care response needs, as you engage with your actual clients – and deal with incoming orders to keep the sales flowing.
When you do this, your business will grow exponentially.
With social media, the customer is king because they will tell everyone about your products and share their user experience by engaging with other fans on various platforms.
