Taking Customer Services to the Next Level: The Importance of Using Multiple Platforms to Engage with your Target Audience

Gone were the days when customer services were limited to snail mail and phone calls. A strongly worded letter used to be the ultimate form of complaint whereby the disgruntled customer would passive aggressively take out their woes on the paper and slam in in the post box and wait for a reply (which they would sometimes never get).

The advent of the internet has given rise to a multitude of platforms to interact with target audience and client base: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, email and live chat to name a few.

The largest difference between traditional forms of communication and online interactions through social media is that everyone can see. Whether it’s a complaint, a show of thanks or a query; both the business and the customer can use the interaction to work in their favour.

Complaints

When it comes to a complaint, displeased customers often choose to use social media to soap box their negative experience. Often, their aim is to tar the brand and share the problem they have had. An example of this would be Kate complaining about the negative experience she had with a certain brand on their Facebook wall:

Kate writing this on the company’s wall means that everybody can witness the bad service that she has experienced. This is a great opportunity for Kate, to get her problem escalated to the right people and for the company to demonstrate excellent customer service. To a certain extent it is also the perfect opportunity for Kate to reap some form of revenge, she is able to ‘punish’ the company for the poor service she experienced by sharing it with the rest of the world on their company page.

Above is an example of it not going too well, below shows how Sky have tackled the problem:

Offering Live Chat is a great way of continuing the interaction and making sure that the issue is resolved. At least attempting to solve the problem is better than completely ignoring it.

Live Chat is another fantastic way of improving customer service, QMS, a company who offer ISO 9001 certification, have found that it is a great way to tap into audiences who would not usually phone or use other mediums for queries and as a result have increased their sales.  Having it as a pop up when you arrive on the website is a great prompt to start interaction and therefore some sort of relationship. Like social media, live chat is great for younger generations who seek the immediacy brought by internet culture but perhaps don’t think to enquire or phone.

Queries

Responding to all of the queries – however dumb they may seem is a great way to improve your brand on an individual level, and sometimes, when done correctly on a national level. A perfect example of this happened earlier in the month:

 

This works in both the customer’s and the business’ favour. The response will make Immy ‘BADMAN’ Bugati feel valued and his query has been answered. For Argos, this was a great PR move, this tweet was covered in many papers across the UK and was also shared almost 10,000 times.

Praise

Similar to complaints, people will often use social media to soap box a good experience and offer thanks for the positive encounter they have had. Encouraging praise on social media is a great idea because it acts as positive reinforcement for the consumer, it also acts as testimonials for the company and is great sharable content.

 

A bakery, Pandoras Kitchen took a screengrab of Rootle’s Instagram and republished it on theirs. Sharing this image not only advertises the food they make but also makes the person who originally took the picture feel special, enhancing the person’s customer experience.

Although being active on all social media channels can be time consuming, try to respond to the majority of social interactions on all of the platforms, negative or positive. It’s a fantastic way to increase brand awareness and develop a relationship with the consumer. Remember, unlike the traditional methods of phone calls and post, when it comes to the online world people are able to ensure that they get through to the right people (or are forwarded to the correct department) and they get through immediately. This sort of direct communication brings a speedier response and also helps to increase customer satisfaction.

Being able to tap directly into your customer base online is a fantastic way to engage with your consumers and improve brand awareness and satisfaction. However, it’s important not to overlook traditional methods of communication.

Sainsburys demonstrated fantastic customer service when they received a letter from a young girl, enquiring about bread.  Her mother posted this interaction on her blog and it went viral resulting in the bread being renamed from ‘tiger bread’ to ‘giraffe bread’. It is possible that this letter could never have been posted online, however the reason it was, was a result of excellent customer service. This demonstrates that people are willing to and have the power to share all of their experiences should them deem it interesting or necessary.

It’s also important not to overlook email when customer service is concerned; in this day and age many people prefer to use this as a method of communication, particularly when it comes to complaints. Emailing means that a log of the back and forth interaction is held by both parties meaning that if anything is called to question they can refer to the previous communications.

So whatever your market, it’s important to consider all platforms of potential interaction that you can have with your client base. Whether your customer service team is large or small, remember that the staff will need to have a common voice and tone to project the image that you would like to portray.

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