When the telephone rings (or however it notifies you) – and you know the call is coming from one of your customers, you answer it.
Then why do companies establish a presence on the social networks and let comments and tweets go unanswered?
I don’t know either.
I do know that your customers expect you to be available to take their “call.” If you are a small business they recognize that it may take you up to 12 hours to respond. If you happen to be a corporation, the standards are much higher – with the expected response time being a matter of minutes.
Engage
Yesterday I shared my reasons why I blogged for 5 years on TypePad – and why I recently moved over here to WordPress. One of the key reasons for sticking with TypePad for so long was the fact that they engaged with me – especially because they responded to my query on Twitter about the differences between TypePad and WordPress.
In fact, the response from TypePad’s community manager offered up the opportunity to connect on the telephone. I took her up on the offer, achieved a greater level of confidence in TypePad, and willingly spent more money to take advantage of services that I was previously unaware of.
Solve Problems
Customer service is a process of solving problems – with products and services, and with helpful tips and advice. I’m not an expert in customer service. But I do know after 10 years in corporate sales, and 20 more running a landscape contracting business, that most customers are very reasonable – they just want a response.
Acknowledging your responsibility to your customer used to be a phone call. Before long an email was sufficient. Now it’s a Facebook page or blog comment – or a tweet.
Stay Connected
The good news is these new methods of communication take a minimal investment of time, especially if you take advantage of services like Postling to monitor your social media channels. Is your business using them?
It’s easy to over think this, so don’t. Just know that communication channels are moving online. Why?
Because that’s where your customers (and competitors) are spending more of their time.
You need to be there with them – solving problems. It takes some effort, but a lot less than is necessary to earn the loyalty of new customers.
It’s worth the effort, don’t you think?
Feel free to leave a comment below – and please share this with your social community on Facebook or Twitter.
Until tomorrow, Jeff