The idea behind social media was to create a dialogue, so it comes as no surprise that users are increasingly using it as their primary means of communicating with brands. In a survey by J.D. Power, more than half of consumers say they use social networking sites of brands for customer service. Therefore, being equipped with a social customer service strategy should not be an option. It should be mandatory.
The most successful companies reach their prospects wherever they are, and your prospects are likely to use social media to contact you. Even if your company offers impeccable customer service like Windstream customer service has a reputation of catering to its customer’s queries immediately, it is still important to integrate social media into your customer service strategy.
As part of your social media customer service plan, there are several things you should focus on — providing proactive support, addressing customer concerns, satisfying customers, and building your brand’s reputation as positive and inspiring.
The following articles cover some social media customer service tips that will assist you in achieving these goals.
Get a Sense of Where Your Customers Are
When developing a social media customer service strategy, you must identify the exact social media platforms on which your customers reach out — and the context within which they do so.
For instance, customers might use Twitter more often to ask questions and complain, as opposed to sharing your posts and tagging your brand on Instagram. As a result, you must examine every channel and platform your brand uses to communicate with customers and improve engagement.
Monitor Multiple Channels to Find Out What People Are Saying About Your Company
Once you have established what social media channels your customers are using to connect with you, it is essential that you plan how to communicate with them in a timely and efficient manner in the future.
This can be accomplished by creating monitoring streams — which can be done easily with Mention or HubSpot’s Social Media too.
Quickly Answer Questions by Building a System
Establish a method to monitor social media for customer feedback and comments to determine the best way to respond. Whether you assign one team member to respond to social media messages on all platforms or divide responsibilities by network, find a solution that works for you – making sure messages are responded to and investigated promptly.
Establish Best Practices to Respond
Whenever your company responds to questions or concerns on social media, we recommend you to have a few best practices in place, like staying positive and being transparent. In doing so, you’ll solve problems quickly and efficiently and cultivate a positive brand image. Your goal isn’t just to solve customers’ problems — you want them to be delighted with you, so they refer you to their family and friends.
Be Positive When Negative Comments Appear
A business usually defends itself when a customer makes a negative comment. Never respond negatively to negative comments. An online complaint appears in the news feed of every single customer, so keep that in mind before formulating a response.
In some cases, negative comments will bring other followers to your business, depending on how likely it is that your business will be the subject of negative comments on social media. Developing positive responses is a crucial part of your social media customer service strategy.
No matter how negative the customer’s opinion is, you should show you value it.
Wrapping Up
By providing excellent customer support on social networks, where your customers are already active, it is possible to strengthen customer relationships and, thus, build a loyal customer base.
The long-term growth and survival of your business are dependent on loyal customers.
The purpose of this post is to demystify social media customer support for you. So hopefully, here you found some useful tips to enhance your social media strategy and increase your customer loyalty.
If you want to learn more about social media customer support, we recommend you take a course online. However, make sure you have a reliable internet connection in place, given you would have to stream multiple lecture videos online. In any given case, you don’t have access to such a connection, call Windstream phone number, and subscribe to one of their internet deals.