A Social Media cardinal sin - Social Media Snubbery!

There is a new form of customer service faux pas doing the rounds, and in line with a large percentage of business is online, and comes in the form of the Social Media snub. 

The old school and still very prominent snub, is in my book one of the worst customer service crimes and can offend a customer in many ways, take a look at the examples below:

-          In order to avoid dealing with you the receptionist ignores your presence and picks up the phone before you reach the counter

-          The bartender who serves all of the pretty girls/guys around you without even acknowledging your existence

-          Or the team members who are so fully ingrained in their conversation to even realise you are there and need their help

A snub shows blatant disrespect and is the biggest way to lose customers, resulting in them bad mouthing you, and sending them directly to your competitors without you ever having the chance to win them back or apologise.

Now the snub has gone online, and is in fact even worse in this form as there is no hiding from it. The disrespect you dish out here is in public and that can hurt a customer and you much more.

The problem is that is can be so easily done.  With so many companies engaging in Social Media without a solid plan, strategy or system, it is quite easy for posts to slip through the net, or remain unanswered for long periods of time

So what is a Social Media snub?

When a post is not answered on a social media site, whilst the page still responds to other questions, adds promotional posts or interacts with other users.

A social snub is worse than those detailed from the above as it is public, people can see that you have been snubbed and that hurts.

There is no mistaking it.  With some of the examples above the age old excuse of “sorry sir I didn't see you there” can be used.  The same can’t be applied on Social Media.  

Other posts are being answered, which in all terms and purposes makes the customer feel that they are not as important as others.

All of the above can have a hugely detrimental effect on your brand, not just from the person you snubbed but also from all of the other people who may now not post due to other posts on your page not being responded to.

6 Ways to avoid the Snub:

-Just answer the question

- If you cannot answer it just say

-Empower your followers to answer the question

-Acknowledge the post and say you will find out the answer soon

-Say you cannot answer the question but give them the details of the person who can

-Ask them to Direct Message you with their details and get someone to call them who can help them

Falling into the trap of thinking that Social Media is cheap form of Marketing or for SEO purposes may mean you are taking the eye off of the ball and alienating customers in the process.  All of this reinforces the need for a defined Social Media strategy for businesses of all sizes, working out a schedule and allocated team members to deal with posts, questions and complaints, alongside engaging in conversations and posting interactive content.

For more information on Paul you can follow him on twitter @paulsonso email him on paul@soandsomarketing.co.uk  and visit www.soandsomarketing.co.uk to find out more on measuring Customer Service and Experience.

So and So Marketing is a full service marketing and design agency based in Weymouth, Dorset and covering the South of England, Wiltshire, Hampshire, Somerset and Devon.

Measure and Incentivize your team on Customer Experience to increase repeat business and staff empowerment!

Does your business measure Customer Service & Experience?

Are you team incentivized purely on sales and revenue generated?

How about incentivizing staff on their customer interactions and the experience the customer has?

When companies are purely focused on sales and revenue it can often lead to potentially great sales but often poor after sales which in turn can hinder repeat custom, and effect that all important word of mouth and social media feedback.

Instead try increasing commission based on after sales questionnaires, or reducing it for poor results, create a Team bonus structure based on customer service results, and empower your team to come up with suggestions to make the customer experience that extra bit special, and reward them based on the results this brings.

Customer Experience awards and bonuses based on yearly, monthly and weekly results is also a great way to incentivise those not directly related to sales within your company and can help to make these employees feel an important and valued member of the team, whilst giving the business the opportunity to monitor both staff and company performance in this area.

In an age where the experience and service your company gives a customer can spread within a matter of minutes and  with consumers expecting more than ever,  can your company afford not measure, analysis and work to improve and excel in this area? 

For more information on Paul you can follow him on twitter @paulsonso email him on paul@soandsomarketing.co.uk  and visit www.soandsomarketing.co.uk to find out more on measuring Customer Service and Experience.

So and So Marketing is a full service marketing and design agency based in Weymouth, Dorset and covering the South of England, Wiltshire, Hampshire, Somerset and Devon.

2012 Marketing Christmas list, 2013 to do list..

On our recent email newsletter I put the below Marketing objectives which I feel should be on all Businesses Christmas lists, so which of these are you putting into place for 2013?

* AN opt in Mobile Database

* Social Media campaign aimed at your audience

* A defined way to measure customer experience

* A LinkedIn Company page

* A website fit for mobile

* Create Strategic partnerships

* A clear, creative and quantifiable marketing strategy for 2013

For more information on Paul and So and So Marketing visit www.soandsomarketing.co.uk email Paul@soandsomarketing.co.uk follow him on Twitter @paulsonso or sign up to their email newsletter by CLICKING HERE

DON’T SPAM, KERBLAM! Being more effective with your Email, Social Media and SMS Marketing!

It is all so easy to fall into the trap when working on SMS, email or Social Media campaigns of constantly trying to sell to your database and thus really just becoming SPAM. The problem is, this becomes boring to the majority of people, annoying to others, and what initially was a brand you trusted and opted in to be part of, now quite frankly bugs the hell out of you. So you either opt out or just ignore the messages completely, from the brands perspective a connection and possible customer is lost. Now when you send your database about an offer or info on something they really want to hear about you don’t have their attention or you cant reach them as they have opted out.

Back in the day when I was a Commercial agent for Sports teams and athletes I had a mantra that I would always speak to our sponsors at least 4 times during the season without asking for money. So I called them to give them free event tickets, make sure their advert was up to date in programme, ask them if they wanted to feature on our email newsletter ….. or just for a general chat. You can be sure when we needed a Man of the Match sponsored during or at the end of the season and their sponsorship renewal was up, they were always happy to speak with me and answered the phone.

The same applies to your database, send messages that show you care, are informative, useful, funny and not just the blatant sale, that way when you have something really great to sell, KERBLAM you have your contacts full attention and you have a good chance to bag a sale…

For more information on Paul and So and So Marketing visit www.soandsomarketing.co.uk email Paul@soandsomarketing.co.uk follow him on Twitter @paulsonso or sign up to their email newsletter by CLICKING HERE

Marketing Spend less Customer Service = Wastage

One of my biggest marketing passions is the art of Customer Experience and Service. How you interact, engage, welcome, deal with problems and make a customer feel about your product, service or experience is by far the most important aspect of your business and your companies marketing plan.

How often do you see companies spending thousands on marketing only to let themselves down by not understanding their customer, or by letting them down with empty promises?  You can be assured if they feel like this, others will do to, and that they have shared these disappointments with many others.

In an age where good and bad experiences can spread digitally in a matter of minutes, the need to analyse, innovate and be ready to exceed customer expectations before even contemplating spending money on marketing is more important than ever.

Just as bad experiences spread quickly so do great experiences.  By exceeding your customers’ expectations, going the extra mile or providing something quite unique, your need for spending money on the more conventional forms of marketing will decrease.

So before you decide to go all out on printing 1000’s of flyers, taking out newspaper adverts, step up your social media interaction or create a new website, take a good look at how you treat, interact and what service you offer to your customers and see if you can make your customer’s experience part of your marketing story, not part of the reasons why however much you spend nothing works!

For more information on Paul you can follow him on twitter @paulsonso email him on paul@soandsomarketing.co.uk  and visit www.soandsomarketing.co.uk to find out more on measuring Customer Service and Experience.

So and So Marketing is a full service marketing and design agency based in Weymouth, Dorset and covering the South of England, Wiltshire, Hampshire, Somerset and Devon.

The Biker FM Speedway Show. 0 – 40000 listeners in less than 15 weeks!

When we first started working with the UK’s biggest online motorbike related radio station Biker FM, little did we know we would help them to create one of the biggest ever online radio shows, and the most listened to show in the stations history.

The Speedway Show was launched in February 2012. We had been working with Biker FM on their marketing strategy and text competitions for almost a year when we worked with the station to launch the Speedway show that we suggested, due both to our knowledge and contacts within the sport, but also due to the large untapped audience the sport had with no Audio outlet for news and content.

On show One we went big, by having former British GP Champion and the UK’s biggest Speedway Star Chris Bomber Harris live on the show, alongside the sport’s most controversial Team Manager Alun Rossiter, and an excellent competition to learn to ride speedway with myfirstskid.com.

Although only ranked number 10 in the station’s rankings, with a marketing push, new presenters (one of them being me surprisingly, believe me, it wasn’t my intention) and continually good guests with World Champions, young hot talent, the sport’s top administrators all mixed in with some controversy, the show started to gain media coverage within the sport and a social media following which saw it rise to number one in the stations rankings by week 10.

On May the 13^th the sport of Speedway was hit by the tragic news that British Speedway ace Lee Richardson had been killed in a track crash in Poland. The speedway family was in mourning and only two days after his sad passing we ran a tribute show to Lee with the blessing of his family. Email and social media tributes came pouring into the show, with some of Lee’s closest friends and racing colleagues coming onto the show to pay tribute to a great family man, rider and friend the word about the show spread worldwide.

The show received over 46’000 listeners, being a station record and crashing the server. Creating further national coverage, not just in the motorcycle press, but also via such media sources as the Daily Star a podcast was released. Again due to such huge demand the server went down but was eventually fixed for many people to listen to one of the most emotional shows broadcast, ending with an interview with Lee recorded right back in show number 2.

The show continues to be Number 1 on the station and with many more ideas to grow this show and the station weekly audience numbers station wide are expected to rise.

So and So Marketing’s first venture into radio land has been a rollercoaster; emotional, tough but rewarding and we look forward to working with BIKER FM into the future and continuing to see listener numbers rise and the profile of the station increase!