Get Social With Your Customer Service Strategy

Using Social Media to drive marketing for your business is nothing new – awareness campaigns that take your brand to a defined audience, engagement campaigns that focus on driving new leads and conversions, content marketing to drive affinity are, or should be, part of any comprehensive marketing plan.

But what else can social media do for us? Well, one of the more overlooked aspects of social media interactivity is customer service.

The simple fact is that over 80% of consumers use social media as the primary tool for engaging with brands, whether in a positive or negative sense.

This means you need to be on your toes pretty much 24/7 to respond, engage and build relationships with your customers.

To help you kick start your customer service-focused social media strategy for 2020, here are Seven Super Tips courtesy of Social Media Today:

1. Time is of the essence – the faster you respond, the more likely your customer is to lead to a positive outcome. The best way to ensure this is to integrate your social media channels into your Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software so that tickets or notifications are raised when there is a direct message or post.
2. Use the database sensibly – once you’ve built up an interested, engaged audience, be sure to plan regular communications that benefit your loyal followers – new offers, early-bird specials, advance access to information and other useful information will foster positive affinities.
3. Personalise responses wherever possible, and limit auto-responding – customers who take the time and trouble to message you directly expect to receive a personalised response. It’s fine to set up limited auto-responses for the hours when your business is closed, but be sure to pick these up asap and respond personally. For technical issues and urgent items, you should have contingency responses in place that give the customer access to the right information and people no matter what the time of day.
4. Put yourself in your customer’s shoes – adopt an empathetic approach to your customer’s needs at all times, and use a solutions-orientated approach to solve their queries quickly and efficiently
5. Horses for courses – be sure to use the correct tone for the correct channel. For example on LinkedIn, you should adopt a more professional tone, whereas for Twitter it may be more casual.
6. Be aware of when to change tack – many customer requirements may take too long to elaborate on in a social media post. A customer will likely request a response to a query or issue that needs you to take things off social media and into a phone conversation.
7. Set and maintain a high bar – ensure that your staff and company policy are singing off the same hymn sheet – this will ensure consistent, efficient and effective customer service standards are set and maintained.

For help setting up your social media channels or strategy for 2020, get in touch with Realnet today on +44 1223 55 08 00 or at info@realnet.co.uk