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Can you afford to ignore social media complaints?

Over the past few years, we have witnessed a massive trend in the way customers use social media and how businesses respond to their needs. Social media shouldn’t be seen as just another channel for proactively sharing news, it is now, more than ever, the first port of call for unhappy customers voicing their complaints.

In fact, studies tell us that nearly half of consumers use social media for customer service issues. Of those, 75% expect a response within one hour of posting and 57% think these response times should be upheld during weekends and out of office hours (according to Edison Research).

For many brands, social media customer service is a grey area – which department does it fall under, whose responsibility is it, who has earmarked budget for this? Questions like this inevitably stall the resolution of customer complaints, which ultimately may be affecting the bottom line.

We work with national leading brands, helping with all facets of social, from proactive to reactive, from our Newcastle and Nottingham PR offices, so with this in mind, I’ve collated my top tips on handling social media customer care.

Act fast: Yes, social media customer service spans marketing and customer service departments, but look at the teams you have in place and consider the best fit and make it fast! A loyal customer is invaluable to your business and if they have taken the time to post on Facebook or Twitter, then it’s likely they’ve told their friends they’re unhappy too. Consider what is more important – safeguarding your current customers or winning new ones. Experts believe, it is six times more expensive to acquire a new customer than keep an existing one and on average a loyal customer could be worth as much as 10 times the value of their first purchase. If you don’t have the resource in house, bring an external supplier on board to help.

Find the right handler: Anyone responsible for social will need to have a good understanding of how all the different channels work and be well versed on your key messages, to ensure customer responses are effectively drafted and on-brand. They’ll also need to have great interpersonal skills – happy to pick up a conversation with customers or internal departments, whilst showing empathy.

Be timely: If customers are expecting a response to their complaint within an hour of them posting it, then ensure that happens. Also consider how this can be resourced at evenings and weekends – if there is a demand, there will be a customer expectation – don’t lose customers to competitors who are already investing in 24/7 support.

Differentiate social channels: Over 30% of Interbrand100 companies use dedicated customer service handles on Twitter. This includes @AmazonHelps, @ASOS_Heretohelp and @Skyhelp. This differentiation strategy means all customer enquiries, whether negative or positive, won’t distract from brand marketing content on main social channels.

Have oversight of the situation: As well as ensuring all problems are effectively investigated and resolved, track what the complaint triggers are and use this trend analysis to apply the learnings and implement better processes throughout your business.

Contact us about our social media customer care training and monthly packages.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Georgina Dunkley .