Is your business proactive with customers by encouraging them to leave positive feedback via social media, review sites and directories?

Read more: http://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/166630/millennials-trust-people-not-brands-when-buying.html?edition=42714#ixzz1kflOlvGU

REad Full Article: http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?R=1008794&ecid=a6506033675d47f881651943c21c5ed4

http://www.mobilemarketer.com/cms/news/messaging/11808.html

http://www.mobilemarketer.com/cms/news/messaging/11808.html

http://www.slideshare.net/eMarketerInc/emarketer-webinar-key-digital-trends-for-2012-10607308

There is no magic formula when it comes to managing your unique brand on social media platforms.  It’s up to you to roll your sleeves up and get started.  Once you have your strategy in place, the best way to see what’s working and what isn’t is to engage, moderate, and analyze all interactions.  Facebook has some great tools to help you manage this in their insights section.

• Don’t spam your audience. Posting updates back to back, multiple times per day, is the best way to get hidden in the news feed.  Monitor what works and slowly develop your strategy from there.  If you are unsure, it’s better to start slow so you don’t risk alienating all of your fans.
• Don’t neglect issues or problems on your page. Social media is a two-way conversation you can have with your customers. When you ignore concerns or questions, it appears as if you don’t care.
• Don’t use formulaic responses. In the same vein as ignoring comments, it’s just as bad to post a canned response to all issues or concerns.
• Social is about THEM, not you.  This can be tricky depending on the TYPE of business.   It really goes back to monitoring what works for your fan base. This is not the place to repost all of your tv commercials, etc.  That is just advertising and you will quickly find yourself with no fans.
• Don’t turn off the wall. While neglecting issues or problems is a bad practice, turning off the wall completely sends the message that you just want to broadcast, not engage.

With Facebook implementing new features every day, it’s becoming increasingly easy for users to hide status updates from appearing in their news feed. While this might be a plus in the personal sphere, it’s a little scary for brands that also appear in the same news feed. In fact, it’s now possible to “unlike” a brand page directly in the news feed without needing to visit the page at all. By adhering to the following best practices (as evidenced by brands that did the exact opposite), your brand’s chance of getting hidden or “unliked” is reduced significantly.

Read More: 5 DOs for Facebook Posts

http://techcrunch.com/2011/03/20/why-women-rule-the-internet/

YOU ARE IN SALES.

There’s what you do to sell, and there’s everything else. There’s your main business and there’s everything else. If you’re not bucketing your time and your chores and your day’s plans accordingly, how do you think the results will turn out?

I lead with sales because I’m convinced that everyone in every organization is now part of the sales force. I also think you’re part of customer service, but there are no customers without sales. Sales comes first. No matter if you’re the bagger at the grocery store to the CFO, your job is sales and then customer service, and if you don’t think it is, your company’s health is probably just as questionable as the rest of the businesses out there.

You Are In Sales

Put sales into every day. Put customer service into every day. Do something to touch both buckets every day. You might also have to do promotion. You might also have to do the grinding chores that make up the rest of the role you play, but your role is sales.

What are you selling? Who knows? Jon sells religion (though I’m sure he’d prefer I not call it sales). Margie sells social media musings. We all sell ideas, at the very least.

When I say it, I tend to mean sales sales, but that’s up to you.

You are in Customer Service

Peter Shankman and Marsha Collier both wrote good books on the new customer service. Read these and think in the ways they talk about it. Customer service is now as important to marketers and operations engineers as it is to the people who answer the phones. And the social phone is ringing. Are you there to answer it?

Think Sales

Sales people don’t push a product; they listen for people’s needs. The really good sales professionals I’ve met sell other people’s products just as readily as they sell the one they’re paid to sell. Get in that habit, the habit of being helpful. Find people’s needs as a matter of fact. Find them even when you’re not really on duty. Listen to people. Listen to what they’re really saying versus what is coming out of their lips. This will pay you forever.

Think Customer Service

The #1 trait of excellent customer service is empathy married to action. Sometimes, empathy is all you can deliver. I’m sitting in an airport writing this at 5AM because our plane was rerouted due to an emergency onboard. It’s no one’s fault. But none of the passengers really want to be here. Everyone has dealt with us with empathy first and foremost, and that’s what matters. They’ve spoken from our side of the fence. They’ve been personal with all their interactions.

Empathy plus action is what makes great customer service. You can practice this as often as possible, too. You can do it at home. Get on the other person’s side of the table as often as possible. Look for potential ways to help. And remember, listening and making someone feel heard is every bit as important an action as any other (note to men: we tend to leap to action instead of helping a woman feel heard – that’s from studies I’ve read and John Gray’s work).

And You?

How are you selling? What works? What feels uncomfortable? When I say you’re in sales, are you feeling it? Or are you still reluctant to accept that?

Read the full article.