Social Media and business

I was reading the latest issue of the Economist (always wanted to say that), and there were was an article on social media titled Too Much Buzz (their Schumpeter column).  It discusses the ways in which businesses are having to deal with social media.  There are many complaints about too much data.  Some say it’s a good thing and is breaking down barriers between businesses and customers.  That it’s allowing customer complaints to be handled more quickly. etc. etc.

As the head of Social Media Marketing for my company (a title no one refers to me by), I get to deal with this up close and personal.  Social Media is a great way to interact with your customers, it’s also a very skewed view of your customer base.  In the past I’ve sent out surveys and the data gathered was interesting.

But.

That data gathered consisted of respondents who are:

• People who responded (obviously)
• People who are online
• People who gave us their email address

This is a limited view of our customers and what they think (response rate was low 20% which apparently is good for Email Blasts).  But, again, it also gave me a glimpse of who some of our most engaged customers are.

When you run a single shop, you know who your most engaged customers are.  They stop in and talk with you, they buy on a regular basis, you’ll hear from other customers that your store was recommended by “so and so”.  In the new internet age, this sort of stuff is happening via Twitter, Facebook, Yelp, etc.

In the new age, if someone takes the time to *like* you on Facebook, or *follow* you on Twitter, they’re telling you they’re *engaged* to your company.  They are, for free, asking to be evangelists for your brand.  Use them. It’s not wrong to do so.  You wouldn’t tell customer’s who come into your shop, “Look I know you like shopping here, but don’t tell other people how great we are.  That would be bragging and wrong.”

If you don’t have an online presence, create one.  Get on Twitter and Facebook. It’s very easy.  Use programs like Tweetdeck to post to multiple accounts at once.  Wordpress has some great publicize features that make posting to Twitter and Facebook a snap.  When you start out it’s really discouraging how few “likes” you have, but you’ll get more.  Also, find brands you carry and “like” them on Facebook.  Post things on their wall (so your brand is seen by others).

Announce sales, specials, new arrivals, etc. on your accounts.  Only post/like articles that are related to your business (read: stay away from politics/religion).  Give people a reason to interact with you online.  Whenever someone posts something on your wall, it’s also on their’s, which means your brand is seen by all their followers.

If you haven’t claimed your business page on Yelp, do so.  See what people are saying about you.  Don’t worry about negative reviews, everyone gets them.  Yelp has a very good page on responding to reviews.

The important thing is to get out there.  It’s really expensive to advertise on traditional media, so make the most of the free media that you can.

Now go out there and claim your online identity today.