Customer Service and Social Media
20 Ways To Grow Your Business Through Social Media – Day 6
There just don’t seem to be enough hours in the day for handling everything business related. If you are a small business owner, your main focus is on building your business and bringing in new customers. Unfortunately, that also means that some tasks are sacrificed. One of them is usually customer service.
Have you ever sent an email to a company through their website and wondered if the response got lost in the ether? Most companies let you know that they will respond in about 24 hours but others seem to push it back to a couple of days. This is frustrating and can cost you customers and your reputation. Social media has made it easier for small companies to act like bigger enterprises by using them as a way to offer better support to customers.
Advantages of Social Media for Customer Service Issues
Let’s look at Facebook and Twitter for a moment. Conversations can be initiated easily by you and your readership. Create a thread or tweet that’s all about feedback. Encourage customers to post any problems they may have. Also, on your website, when you receive notices of customer issues, link them to your social media pages to find the solutions.
Now, this type of interaction does require you to check your platforms regularly throughout the day. Respond to comments to let readers know that answers will be forthcoming. Create posts, videos or instructional sheets that answer the questions that customers have. Any specific issues can be addressed in an email back to the person initiating it. But, general questions can have answers posted on social media to be of use to everyone.
As a business owner, this is your chance to sound like a real person and not a cardboard cutout. The informal nature of social media allows you to speak directly with your audience to address what is most pressing to them. This doesn’t mean that you have to expose any deep dark secrets to do so. It does, however, mean that you use an understanding tone of voice and actually provide a viable solution to the issue.
People want to know that they are being taken seriously and that they are being heard. This can be a difficult task to manage online. Social media makes it easier for customers to get to know the companies they do business with and vice versa.
