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Quick question : What have you heard most on Twitter? Complaints about brands or praises ?

 

I bet its complaints. Because, thats the way it is online, etch that in your diary.

 

When it is online talk, people love to talk negative things about brands. Negative things like complaints, errors, problems with service/product, suggestions etc. Yes and a bit of praise too but thats very rare.

 

Now, dont you question it !

 

Many folks venture out to social media as a marketing tool, which essentially is wrong (as Ive repeated time and again).

 

Social Media is more of a listening platform, so your marketing cannot be the typical hey-look-how-awesome-my-new-product-is line, rather more of a how-can-i-make-it-better or what-can-i-do-to-make-you-opt-for-my-product line.

 

So this is how you do it.

 

Assuming you have a decent product (Skip this if youre Apple.), social media is a persuasive medium to give reasons to people to buy your product. Not in a pushy way but in an impressing way. Your job on social media would be to,

 

a) Find out what people like and dislike about yours and competitor’s products.

B) Find out what the natural tone of talk is for your target segment.

c) Find out ways to entice your target customer and

d) Find out ways to retain and convert complaints.

 

Sounds simple, doesnt it ? Well, easier said than done.

 

Let me give you an example of an internet service provider.

 

The product Internet startup kit for smart phones.

The target Social Media savvy, internet savvy, on-the-go mobile, you know.

Medium Facebook, Twitter.

 

Now, the product is the best in market. Which means that its better off compared to other brands. But its not devoid of problems. There are signal issues, activation delays etc.

 

Now this is how a typical new-to-socialmedia company would behave.

 

1. Collect all your BTL, ATL marketing material. Port it for the web, good enough to go on a website. Example: Flyers, POP stand designs etc be made into web form optimized images so that they can be placed on the site and promotions run.

 

2. Create campaigns for Google SEM and Facebook Ads.

Example: Promotions and Early bird prizes that goes out targeted to every popular portal and facebook sectors (Age > 20, Office goer, Social Media Enthu, Twitter/FB user etc)

 

3. Promote all your campaigns across horizontal platforms and count the ROI based on money spend. Money spend in one month v/s Number of new applications signed via online referrals.

 

Sounds fair and square isnt it ? Well, actually it is. Theres nothing visibly wrong but certainly missing. Once the campaign is over, the ROI would be calculated and success ratio counted. But what they fail to miss (and is very important) is the amount of damage done and the repair time available.

 

Once new applicants sign in, a typical marketing campaign is full and closed. In new age marketing (or something like that as they call) it begins from there.

 

Earlier, one wouldnt know much about how your product is doing unless you did a market survey or counted the number of problematic calls at your customer care department. Even if you did, there were at least four levels of filtering happening that would pretty much die out the severity of a typical problem.

 

Enter social media.

 

Now, you have a user generated report of all the customer complaints (yes, save on your agency fees for that), with customer details, his history, his friends circle, how influential he is, information whether he uses competition products to name a few.

 

Now, when was the last time your market research firm gave so much information about your client ?

 

So pounce on it. Take them seriously. Record them. Analyze them and deploy an action team to fix them.

 

Its not going to be easy because constant conversations happen as you try to fix it. The only way out is to be genuine.

 

- Accept whats wrong with your service. Explain why certain areas with lower signal strength will have connection issues.

- Give tips to boost your signal strength, just like how a friend of theirs would do.

- Show them through videos how your product is doing better than the competition in low connectivity areas and give skeptics no room for speculation.

- Make a statement that youre out there to serve your clients better. (And work towards it.)

 

This is how social media can support your overall marketing activities (to name a few ways that is). Its important that you reach out to your audience through conversations. Listen and act upon them and theres no better way to do it than social media today.

 

So next time you hear people complaining about your product, dont shy away. Treat it like a time bomb. Take care of it and diffuse it asap or itll explode anytime. Of course, this isnt easy, but is marketing any better?

 

Hope youre listening ?

 

Join Mani Karthik on FacebookWhy you should listen to negative talk about your brand online was posted at DailyBloggr.com by Mani Karthik.

 

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Related posts:

1. Social Media Tips : How would you market your product online ?
2. How does your online visiting card look?
3. Online Reputation Management – Problems and Solutions

 

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Twitter redirecting your business online, and The consumers can be share a comment on them, they like share good comment and or bed for your products. It's show your products based review with consumers.