Social media’s a quick, fun way to connect with customers — and it can become a time-sucking, resource-wasting endeavor. Here’s how to use the platform effectively.
Make no mistake: Social media is part of the customer experience landscape. But it’s still difficult to determine a true ROI for Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and all things social.
So spending too much time gathering information, posting it and responding to comments can potentially waste time and resources.
One caveat: Responding to customers who have serious questions and issues in social media is a worthwhile investment of time and money. People pay attention to how you treat customers in social media and make buying decisions based on that.
Here are five tips to effectively use social media for the customer experience:
1. Be picky
You might feel you need a presence on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Instagram and LinkedIn.
A better bet is to pick one or two platforms and do them well. Which one(s)? Use this list from marketing experts at Business Know-How as a guideline:
- Twitter is for influencers. Best fitted if you and your customers are leaders in your field.
- Facebook is best geared to a general population that is older than 30. (The younger generation goes for other platforms).
- Pinterest tends to appeal to women more than men and is ideal for products, services and businesses that are creative and visual.
- Instagram works well for companies that want to connect with a youthful audience.
- LinkedIn is best used to reach a strictly professional customer base and relationship.
Picking one or two that will help you connect with your ideal customer gives you the time to gather and post the best possible content — and respond to customers who follow you.
2. Schedule everything
Facebook allows you to schedule posts within the platform. Hootsuite allows you to schedule for different or multiple platforms from its dashboard. Unless you’re a news network that has to post breaking news, you can schedule just about any content to post in an hour, day or week from the time you write it.
There are a host of social media management systems that can also analyze the best times to post, plus track and analyze your effectiveness, for a fee.
3. Call in the troops
Nearly everyone in your company has some interesting insight that could be fodder for social media content. Ask everyone for suggestions. They may not be comfortable writing about a pleasant encounter with a customer, a new feature on a product or an employee day of philanthropy. But their ideas will spark interesting content that will allow you to get customers more acquainted with your company.
4. Get customers’ help
User-generated images and content gain higher engagement rates than company-generated images and content. Ask customers to submit photos of them experiencing your products and services. Run a contest, giving a prize for the most creative photos. Set up a hashtag for any events you sponsor and ask them to use it when they post.
5. Know what’s ‘enough’
As powerful as social media can be in building a better customer experience, there are times when things are better left unsaid or unposted.
If you don’t have the resources to attend to social media at least 10 hours a day during the work week, or your business doesn’t serve the public, you probably don’t need social media in your customer experience arsenal.
