Raise your hand if you work in social media.
Congratulations, you work in customer service.
I know, it doesn’t sound very glamorous and you probably don’t appreciate the comparison. But it’s true.
Yes, as a CM you do more than just answer people’s questions about your brand/product/service. And as a content creator you don’t do that at all. And as a project manager you don’t even talk to the customers. But you are all in customer service.
Community Managers, when you tweet “good morning” or a tip or a fact or some other conversation starting message, you are essentially saying “welcome to Wendy’s, may I take your order?”. You’re welcoming those people to your brand and you’re starting a conversation that you hope leads to a new follow, a retweet and eventually a sale.
When someone sends your brand a PM on Facebook asking why your website’s payment gateway isn’t working or telling you that they’ve been waiting 2 weeks for that prize that you promised them, you’re doing the same job that the Rogers call center agent is when I call to ask why my bill is so high and where’s my phone upgrade that I believe I’m entitled to regardless of the rules.
Content Creators, when you come up with posts that push people to your website or elicit comments and likes and shares you are inviting people to tell you what they think about your brand. You are asking for opinions, complaints and questions. And while you may not be responding to those messages, it is up to you to think about what they may be and what you are asking before you plug those posts into a content calendar.
Note: I highly recommend working from some sort of content calendar. Give yourself the relief of structure and a plan rather than waking up every morning wondering what you’re going to posting when you get to the office.
Project Managers, you’re working hand in hand with your clients or VPs to make sure that your content team and CM are carrying out the vision and plan. Just like the supervisor at The Gap is working with their team to entice customers into the store, make them comfortable and happy and to hit sales targets while reporting to their district manager. You may be in the office doing paperwork and counting money, but you’re still on the headset with the floor staff and if there’s an issue with a return you’re going to be called into action.
In the current world of social media we are all in the customer service business. If you try to avoid it, deny it or ignore it, you are asking for more trouble that you might expect. If you embrace it, prepare for it and do it well, you are in for more praise and payoff than you also might expect.
The internet generation has developed an expectation for immediate response. They don’t want to pick up the phone and wait on hold. They want to tweet you and have you answer them right away, the same way that their best friend does. They expect that you, as an extension of your brand, can fix their problem for them, after all – what good are you if you can’t? They want to be serviced in the easiest, fastest, most convenient way possible.
So the question for every brand becomes: How do we do this right?
The answer may be very different for each of you. Regardless of how much frontline customer service your brand is willing or able to do via social media, it important is to do a few things.
1) Set expectations. Are you going to respond within 1 hour between Monday and Friday from 9 to 5? Do you have someone available outside of business hours to handle questions or emergencies? Are you offline for the weekend?
2) Live up to those expectations. Don’t skip the hard questions because they’re unpleasant. Don’t skip the same old boring questions because they’ve been asked a thousand times and you’re sick of them. Stay in contact with your community while you look for or wait for an answer to a question that is outside of your reach.
3) Be prepared for everything. When you post about your exciting new product be ready for questions about what it does, why it’s so expensive, where they can buy it, why they can’t buy it overseas and complaints about your old products and your brand and how you don’t care about your customers and how much you suck. All of those messages are just an F5 away from showing up on your screen. Have a plan of attack for responding to negative comments (I like to kill them with kindness) and know where to direct people for more information and when it’s time to take something offline to best handle it and resolve an issue.
Being good at customer service isn’t hard. But it takes work and dedication. It’s no different in social media.
You can do it. You really don’t have a choice not to.
And when you do it right and people are talking about how great your brand is – it will be worth it.
Good luck, some days you’re going to need it.
- Joshua
* There are exceptions to every rule. Including this one.
** In case you didn’t figure it out, I worked at Wendy’s, Rogers and The Gap.
