Apparently, many small businesses find customer service via social media unnecessary and/or ineffective. According to a study commissioned by Conversocial and conducted by assistant professor of communications Liel Leibovitz at New York University, this is certainly not the case. I found this being discussed in an article by Rieva Lesonsky on the Huffington Post titled, Customers Say Small Business Social Media Efforts Failing: Survey Says.
The issue at hand is that not all small businesses know the impact of customer service via social media. Of course, not all have had or taken the opportunity to study business, advertising or public relations, where the lessons on how to reach all audiences, the importance of feedback, and the mediums that need to be used are taught. So this survey is a great form of evidence that customer service via social media is really, really important.
Do you, as a business, find interaction with customers via social media as a current fad? Because, customers surely do NOT.
In the study done by Leibovitz, “the majority (50.7 percent) of consumers say they currently use social media to communicate with businesses.” A little over half of customers is A LOT. Further proving the point of social media’s significance. And not only is interacting and providing feedback for customers on social media not just a fad; “78 percent believe that social media platforms will either soon entirely replace other means of customer service, or become the dominant way for consumers to communicate with businesses.” This is a notion that we constantly discuss in class. There is so much evidence of the flourishing of social media, notwithstanding the fact that everything around us is slowly but surely developing electronically and technologically, soon enough everything is going to be managed digitally whether we like it or not. This definitely does not have to be a bad thing if you jump on the social media bandwagon now before it is developed into a space ship. The sooner a small business starts utilizing social media, the sooner the benefits will present themselves, and the action in itself gets easier and easier knowing the proper ways to go about it.
I don’t mean to present this information to be the bearer of bad news for the non-tech-savvy businesses out there; I want to simply inform on just how much becoming appropriately tech-savvy can help. “The bad news is, customers aren’t getting what they want from these interactions. Just 8 percent report being satisfied or very satisfied with businesses’ responsiveness on social media. Almost one-third say their complaints or messages had been ignored by companies. And a whopping 88 percent say if they see that their or other customers’ complaints on social media are ignored, they’d be less likely to buy from those companies in the future.”
These are some serious statistics to consider. Why?… Leibovitz explains perfectly below.
Why it matters to your business: Having a social media presence does your company no good if you’re not active. A Facebook page or Twitter account filled with unanswered questions, complaints or concerns does the opposite of what you intend: It shows prospects that you really don’t care about customers’ problems. If you’re going to get involved in social media (and by all means you should), don’t bite off more than you can chew. Start slowly enough that you can actually be responsive and develop relationships. That’s what social media is all about.
Nevertheless, social media is an extremely important tool and needs to be used proficiently for effective customer service. Thanks for reading, and stay tuned for more !
Smiles,
CR
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Good post on the importance of engaging your customers, but even on a level beyond just pleasantries. Many small businesses don’t understand the power of social media in relation to their brand and don’t realize that when someone takes the time to tweet about a problem, there’s the possibility that it is seen by their followers who may share their sentiments. It’s important to remind small businesses to set aside time to engage their audience and answer any customer service concerns.
That is a great point. Thank you Morgan !