Social media
Complainers on Social Media – What to do?
Posted by Jennifer Maxfield in Social media, Uncategorized on October 23rd, 2009
Complainers on Social Media – What to do?
Advice on how to write an effective complaint.
When we first started learning about social media, one of the most pervasively sited reasons for delving in was the idea that the “conversation” is going on without you; you might as well participate; it’s a golden opportunity for you to be able to influence and respond to the dialogue versus simply ignoring it. This is especially true with negative feedback I think – I buy in to the idea that it’s better to know about it then be completely ignorant to it – and I also buy in to the idea that it can help drive positive changes within your company/product/service, that is, if your company structure is flexible enough and has the time and personnel to be making responsive changes.
Anyhoo, what I’ve realized recently is that this whole idea of engaging “influencers” and targeted groups is great when it’s all positive, but when you are dealing with an angry, frustrated or disappointed individual, it’s very hard to know what to do. There are two ways to probably look at this situation: 1) This is a great opportunity to showcase our customer service skills 2) Wow, this looks really bad; we need to get rid of this post. Now, you may poo poo on the option 2, but honestly, I know very few companies who feel comfortable getting in a pissing match with an irate customer that is most likely not going to be swayed by a compelling argument, no matter how sincere, congenial or right the argument may be, especially in such a public forum. You run the risk of further infuriating the negative “post-er” and you also run the risk of making the other people in your social media community uncomfortable. For me, there is really no light
at the end of the tunnel that is assured when reaching out to the angry, let alone a predictable response when engaging the author of a negative comment; you may just be adding fuel to the fire. So, what do you do?
Here is one suggestion I thought of, although this is just an idea meant only for discussion; I have no idea if this would be the “right” course of action:
If someone does post a negative comment and you don’t feel comfortable leaving it on your wall for example on Facebook, take it down, but let them know via a message that the comment did not go unnoticed. The next step in my example is inviting them to share their opinions on a blog or in a forum; you would like them to be able to weigh in on the important topic they brought up. You can create a specific entry or topic around that complaint, and then have a subject matter expert within the company respond. (This is assuming that the negative comment had some semblance of intellectual value and wasn’t just a string of manipulated, but obvious expletives.) A blog or forum is more conducive to in-depth conversation, dialogue that can’t be achieved in short posts like on Facebook. And in my opinion, both offer a more appropriate platform for this type of communication; you are not ignoring the individual. You are actually giving them a voice in an arena that is more private for you, the business, (Not public on a “wall” that pops up on all your fans or friends pages.) yet STILL AVAILABLE to the public – since some people just want to make a “public” stink. And, you are actually doing a couple of things that social media people always tout – ENGAGING and LEARNING!
(One caveat to my previous statement about blogs and forums being more “private”, bloggers link to other bloggers, and the viral growth and page ranking growth of a blog or forum can be greater than a Facebook page in a lot of ways. You of course don’t want this blog or forum coming up higher on Google than your company web site, especially if it’s addressing a cluster of complaints, so I would put together a Key Word avoid List, so that the author avoids using certain words and tags.)
Back to my point – with a blog or a forum, you’re also providing great content that others may find interesting and compelling. For forums specifically, content is more like a discussion, so others may feel the need to defend, agree, disagree, etc. All great stuff. And, you don’t just have to address complaints; the majority pf posts can be about the good stuff going on, educational stuff, editorial stuff etc. One of the main pitfalls of my defer-to-blog idea, is you have to have someone with the time and confidence to be the discussion point person on behalf of the company. This can be a very difficult situation in that if something is said that is wrong, it may fall back on this individual, and often times, having an approval process can be too tedious – by the time a discussion or content is approved, it may be too late. A possible solution to this is to not make it an obvious company blog – meaning don’t post Official CEA Blog all over the place or host it on your company site etc.
Disclose that the author works for and is paid by CEA, but the comments and discussions this individual posts represent their opinions only. You still have to have a huge trust factor, but this may be a good option for some. Lastly, one other pitfall is that most companies are uncomfortable with housing a collection of complaints in one place and making it so readily available for anyone to find it on the web. This is a legitimate issue; so it’s really just weighing your options:
1. Take down the post – that’s that (May even want to block the post-er.)
PS – There is no shame in this! It’s your social media page. And, if you don’t want to be social with someone who is slamming you, it’s your right to manage the page the way you want! You don’t “owe” anyone anything – this is your tool, and although ENGAGING, talking, and interacting is all part of the true beauty of social media, it’s ultimately your tool to wield and control how you see fit.
2. Talk to them on Facebook – Facebook has a “Discussion” tab where you can carry on the conversation away from the extremely exposed “wall”.
3. Alternative game plan – like the blog or forum.
Whatever you choose to do, make sure you have a protocol in place for dealing with
negativity on your social media sites. It will happen, so ya gotta have a plan.
FOR CONSUMERS:
My advice for those posting negative feedback is to keep it clean and keep it smart. I saw a post from someone on one of our client’s social media pages where they were very frustrated when trying to sign in to the web site. They went point for point, talking about what was going wrong. Turns out, there were programming issues with this crucial page, and they ended up fixing the log-in. The important thing to note, yes, she was frustrated and yes, it wasn’t a cushy post, but it was written in a way that wasn’t overtly inflammatory and that wouldn’t cause any immediate discomfort just from reading it. A post worth commenting back to! So, negative post-ers, if you want to post a complaint, concern, or vent, make sure that it’s worth posting, and don’t lash out! It will just get you removed or blocked from ever posting again. But, more importantly, if you have a legitimate statement to make, the best way to get it resolved or addressed when
using social media as your outlet is to not abuse it. In my social media world, be respectful and you’ll receive respect in return. ☺
www.ceamarketing.com
CEA Marketing: Social Media Done Wrong?
Posted by Jennifer Maxfield in Advertising, Social media on October 6th, 2009
ARTICLE
http://www.finextra.com/fullstory.asp?id=20559
Vantage Credit Union to offer account information and funds transfers via Twitter
RESPONSE TO ARTICLE
Interesting . . . this article kind of hit a nerve today as I just had a recent convo with someone about this. 
Soooooo, now I’m going to go on a soap box for a second . . .
This is just one of those things that I personally don’t think belongs in the world of social media. If you don’t want it to be shared, I don’t think it should be included in the communications plan for social media. I think it’s a cute idea, but the risks in my opinion totally outweigh the benefits. To answer general questions about the credit union, as a customer service tool that is not automated is a different story – individuals seeing that type of messaging, whereby the credit union is providing great customer service, showcasing their responsiveness and expertise, as well as showing people that they care to be there for their members is something worth using a social media platform for – where others seeing it is a benefit to the company. In this case, everything is confidential and you are using a social medium just because it’s all a-buzz right now when there are other methods that are less risky. Also, anything that relies on using an automated means of communication again goes against the grain of “Social” media. People don’t like to talk to robots – social implies people talking to people. I like their idea here, but I think it belongs with e-alerts or a log-in page on the web site, or even a log-in .mobi page so people can access it on their phones – a more secure method of communication – not to mention, you have no control over when Twitter goes down; it has a lot of technical issues, playing catch-up technically due to it’s overnight explosion, and we don’t know what improvements or changes are going to be made – The lack of control can be a dangerous thing if people start to rely on this type of usage. it seems like a very large and possibly dicey investment logistically without a lot of return, other than to say you use Twitter in a novel way.
As mentioned in the article e-alerts can basically do the same thing but don’t have the same security issues.
www.ceamarketing.com
Social Media: The New Way to Win Friends and Influence People
Posted by Kelly Bosetti in Social media, Uncategorized on July 8th, 2009
Q: Everyone is using social media platforms. How have the rules changed on traditional marketing? How do you build a successful marketing program on the web?
The choices for marketing and public relations look a lot different than the old days. In the past, real estate agents could stick a for sales sign in the front yard and the phone calls would pour in. House hunters spent the weekend at open houses looking for a place to call home. Today, most industries, not just homebuilding, have to be me more creative in driving traffic to their products. Social media has become the new kid on the block that everyone wants to befriend. Because of a struggling economy and the evolution of technology in the 21st Century, we now have new online media avenues like blogs, social networking, and online forums that have homebuyers literally hanging on to the edge of their keyboards to take it all in. The web is the perfect opportunity to tell the world about your expertise. If you have not dove into the social media world, now is the time.
Understanding Social Media
Pulling a dusty encyclopedia from the family study was the old school way to research a topic unfamiliar to you. Now, we bring a cup of coffee into our home office and surf the web. Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia with constantly updated definitions.
Wikipedia defines Social media as online content created by people using highly accessible and scalable publishing technologies. At its most basic sense, social media is a shift in how people discover, read and share news, information and content. It’s a fusion of sociology and technology, transforming monologues (one to many) into dialogues (many to many) and is the democratization of information, transforming people from content readers into publishers. Social media has become extremely popular because it allows people to connect in the online world to form relationships for personal, political and business use.
Sound overwhelming? Take it slow. Spend time researching blogs and online forums in the homebuilding industry. Some good ones to follow are topbuilderblogs.com, and themartellexperience.com/blog/.
Writing Effective
The number one rule in marketing and public relations in the homebuilding industry is to understand the needs of the homebuyer and communicate your expertise. Think about the message you want your niche industry to hear. Writing is not a bunch of strung together adjectives that make a house sound pretty. It’s about giving the homebuyer what they want in digestible nuggets relevant to their desire to build or buy a home.
Blogs are powerful mediums in establishing connectivity because you can get instant feedback after a blog has been posted. Blogs are meant to drive action and what better way to convince someone to take that step than having the ability to respond instantaneously. Writing a blog is one of the most proactive solutions to fighting the negative mainstream media on the housing industry. You can offer custom-friendly answers to any issue that is currently flooding the market. If a newspaper columnist has written a negative piece about the down market, have your sales team put together numbers that prove otherwise in your company. Always be first and always be credible. Blogs should be well thought out communication tools not last minute thoughts thrown together. Communication is power and opting for plain language as opposed to standard industry jargon goes a long way.
Getting Followers
Building an audience for your social media efforts can be exhausting at first and it may be easy to get discouraged just understand it takes time. People need to know where to find your relevant posts. It’s best to create links to your hompage, online news room, post to your Twitter and Facebook accounts and work into online newsletters. People are even beginning to put their social media information on business cards and in their e-mail signature.
Blogs, tweets and Facebook posts should be done on a daily basis on topics of industry interest with your personality incorporated into the mix. Homebuyers like to do business with people they know and trust. Everyone including the media, homebuyers, homebuilders and your competition is on the web reading social media content.
Consistent and regular social media updates produce higher traffic with solid search engine results. Tracking your social media efforts can be done by setting up free Google alerts. An e-mail will be delivered to your inbox when the key words you have selected are published.
Once you have built a following base, you want to keep them, so ensure you are interacting with those who send you direct messages to your Twitter account or posts responses to your blog entry. Etiquette also says to follow those who are following you within reason and reply to posts in a timely fashion. Someone in your marketing department should always been monitoring your social media accounts.
Social media can be scary because there are so many unwritten rules to follow. Relax. Do your research and put together a plan of action. It may be hard to hit the send button on your first blog entry or tweet post, but once you start the rewards are plentiful.
Advertising: Keeping the Storm at Bay
Posted by Kelly Bosetti in Advertising, Business, Marketing, New Media, Public Relations, Social media, Web on April 21st, 2009
The biggest mistake most companies make during a financial storm is freezing all marketing dollars instead of finding a way to dance in the rain. In a recent survey conducted by the Association of National Advertisers (ANA), 77 percent of marketers say they plan on reducing their advertising budgets. These budget cuts usually include every niche of marketing except web-based.
Is this the best strategy to weather through the storm? The simple answer is no. In the current economic environment building name recognition and brand loyalty is crucial to empowering consumers to buy. Maybe its time to do some flood control with our marketing efforts by investing in a multi-channel advertising approach as opposed to fishing for the cheapest bait and hoping to get some bites.
A multi-channel advertising approach is the best strategy to reach consumers. It’s important to spend money on traditional advertising like billboards, radio, television and print to drive consumers to a web site. Once a company has saturated themselves in the market than social media is a viable option to continue promoting the business and attracting new business. Social media takes time to build relationships encouraging people to check out the company’s new Facebook, blog and Twitter accounts. The Internet has made unbelievable amounts of information accessible, but it also has contributed to the information overload consumers complain about, so it’s important to provide relevant information.
Now is the time to put a strategic advertising campaign in place. With so many businesses cutting their advertising budgets, think about the market share available. Also several media outlets are running specials or have discounted rates. Consumers are eager to hang up their rain coats and begin spending during sunnier days. Already, they have begun paying closer attention to their mailboxes and inboxes looking and researching for the best deals. A successful marketing campaign does not mean you have to purchase the Rolls Royce limited edition. Smart companies are advertising with al carte options that appeal to their mission.
So before allowing the rising water to swallow up advertising dollars, think about investing in a marketing plan that will have financial survivors shopping again.
SOCIAL MEDIA: THE NEW WAY TO WIN FRIENDS AND INFLUENCE PEOPLE
Posted by Kelly Bosetti in Business, Social Networking, Social media, Web on March 24th, 2009
Q: Our marketing budget has been scaled back significantly and I’d really like to keep our company’s name out there. I keep hearing about social marketing, but I don’t really know much about it. How do I get started?
A: Let’s face it, we’ve all run from traditional media. We’ve watched the real estate sections in our local papers shrink down to next to nothing. Our budgets have been butchered and our hands have been tied. Yet we are still expected to sell homes. That’s our job.
So how do we do it with such limited resources?
Today, we’re hearing more and more about social media, the next ‘big thing’ in brand marketing. It seems you can’t read a magazine or watch the news without hearing something about Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin or blogs. Some sales and marketing professionals pass this off as yet another trend or fad that’ll be replaced by something else in the near future… maybe even as early as next week.
People said the same thing about the Internet 15 years ago.
Most people in the homebuilding industry tend to want to shy away from social marketing because it’s a tough thing to wrap their heads around. And that’s easy to understand because the very essence of social media flies in the face of conventional sales and marketing techniques. What successful social marketers need not only to understand but also to embrace is that today’s consumer is all about relevance—they’re looking to hear from people who understand what they are interested in, what they’re concerned about, what their aspirations are or what they love.
Translation: In the world of social media, sales pitches, price points, etc., are going to make you look bad.
Getting Started
There are a few things to keep in mind once you have made the decision to enter the world of social media:
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- Take your time—take your time to a) get used to the way things work and b) watch what others (i.e., your competitors) are doing. This will help you become more comfortable.
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- Keep it up—once you have made the commitment and started building your social media strategy, you have to keep it up. The more active you are, the more relevant you become.
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- Change your outlook—many marketers both In and outside the building industry are afraid of sites with user-generated content because they could become subject of very open and honest criticism. Challenge yourself to tackle such challenges very publicly as an open demonstration of your dedication to customer service—those who follow you online will take note of your responsiveness.
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- Use your imagination—go to sites like Facebook and Youtube to see what other builders have done. Don’t be afraid to borrow a concept and make it your own.
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- Keep it simple—whatever you say or do, make it easy to understand. Twitter limits ‘tweets’ to 146 characters for example. Consumers who participate in online communities are quick to filter out irrelevant messages.
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- Define yourself—Think about the best sales person you’ve ever met, or develop a set of qualities your ideal salesperson would have, and build your social presence on that premise. In many respects your website is your online face of your brand. Your social media persona becomes your online brand voice.
Best Uses of Social Community Sites
In traditional media such as print, television, radio, outdoor, each medium is best suited to a particular purpose, and the creative designed to support each one is different. The same applies to social media. Some sites, such as Facebook, Linkedin and Twitter, are best used for developing a mass of followers and friends. Sites like Flickr and Youtube are better suited to generating a viral buzz. Here are some examples of how you can use some of the more popular sites to keep your name out there and gain fans.
Youtube
With millions of clips uploaded and viewed daily, how many of us have not gone to youtube.com to watch a funny clip or a music video? Now how does a homebuilder with no budget fit in that corner of cyberspace? Here’s a very simple example: One sales person we met went out and bought a $300 digital video camera. After a potential buyer leaves his community, he goes back to the model they were most interested in. He tours the home while giving a running narrative. He goes back to his office, uploads the video to Youtube, and sends the client a link in an email saying, “Hey there, it was great meeting you today. I’m sure you saw several homes in several communities today, so I wanted to send you a link to a video clip I shot of the Blakesmore model we toured…” By doing that, the sales person a) followed up, b) reminded the customer that he paid attention to what he liked, c) clearly stood out from the other communities they may have toured that day.
Do you have TV commercials? Post them. Do you have a closed-loop video playing in your showroom or model center? Post it. Have video footage of someone in your company conducting a home buying seminar? Post it all. Just make sure it’s not too long (5-7 minutes max) and make sure the quality is relatively good. You’d be surprised what people find interesting.
Twitter
As mentioned earlier, Twitter is best used to direct people to other sources for information. To become a most effective “tweeter”, you need to follow a lot of people, and you need to get people to follow you. Once you’ve created your account name (make it easy to identify—like ABCHomesDallas), search for people in your market territory—start with Realtors, or local news reporters for example—and start following them. Try to build up a network of at least 100 people that you follow in your first week. Then start getting people to follow you by ‘tweeting’ regularly with information such as links to:
• Blogs about the homebuilding industry you find interesting
• Online articles about home buying trends that consumers might find useful
• Your youtube clips
• Your facebook page
Remember, each tweet is limited to 146 characters, so try to include just a quick introduction such as “Here’s a great article about new home sales” and then paste the link. To keep the length of your links down, copy the original link and go to www.tinyurl.com and paste it in its converter. It will create a brand new URL that is significantly shorter. The more frequently you post and the more relevant the information you post, the more people will actually start following you, and that’s when you know you’re doing it right.
Facebook
The Mothership of all social media sites, Facebook has skyrocketed in both members and in cash value. Originally created as a Myspace for 20-somethings, Facebook has evolved into a sprawling online entity where friends can reconnect and keep in touch, and where brands can connect and talk to people who love them. In the consumer-to-consumer world, Facebook creates a forum in which people become friends with one another. In the business-to-consumer arena, brands give consumers the opportunity to become fans. To get started, search the site for current and/or recent home buyers and ask them to become fans. Next, turn to your prospects and Realtors. As you continue to grow your fan base, continue to give people a reason to check in with you—promote a webinar, post a why-buy-new video, field a survey, link to your blog. Just keep active and stay relevant. For instance, Jim Dietch of Tampa Bay’s Southern Crafted Homes has a fan base of just over 300 Facebook members, and has already attributed sales to his social media activity.
If all of this seems overwhelming and complicated, don’t worry. You’re certainly not alone. There are some fantastic resources online that can help give you more and more insight into the best practices of social marketing, and more and more books are being published every month. Countless companies conduct webinars—often free of charge—every week. So dig in, get connected and make friends and earn fans. You may be surprised to see just how many people really like you.