Call Center Social (Media) Hour
by Mary Cook, Call Center Industry Practice Manager, Varolii -
January 1, 2013
Call Center Social (Media) Hour
By Mary Cook, Call Center Industry Practice Manager, Varolii
Customer service should go where their customers are situated. And where are customers these days? They are on Facebook and Twitter, writing and sharing their experiences with others, both good and bad. With more than 1 billion Tweets sent every week and more than 500 million active Facebook users, social media is increasingly replacing the traditional methods of communication, such as in-person interaction, phone calls and even email.
Companies need to embrace the use of social media technologies to reach consumers if they want to stay at the forefront of customer service. Social media is a communication channel that will undoubtedly continue to drive leadership, technology and process innovations in call centers. Whether you are trying to acquire service or retain your customers, social media is a channel that can and should be added to your enterprise and call center communication strategy.
Call centers that recognize the fact that their customers are relying on social media for communication and reach out to them through this channel have the opportunity to strengthen existing customer relationships and loyalties, and build new ones. Still, some call centers are lagging in their social media efforts. In a recent social media study performed by In The Know, a Division of M.E.R, two in five companies have not initiated a social media strategy at all. They are missing a valuable opportunity for establishing effective communication through these frequently used channels.
Social Media Strategy To Do List
Before jumping into social media, call centers should have a social media game plan in place. Similar to any other communication channel, you need to make sure you are monitoring, responding and measuring your social media communications.
Monitor. Companies can learn about their customers by monitoring their social media activity, and reach out to them in ways that are personal and meaningful and across the customer lifecycle. Having an infrastructure that allows you to capture these interactions can also help you turn the data gathered from monitoring customers into valuable insight. This enables you to improve your social media communications with each customer interaction. Social media communications can and should be used to acquire new customers, service those you have, retain them, and then turn them into advocates of your brand.
Respond. Customer service issues that surface should be addressed in real-time and resolved immediately. Otherwise a company’s name could be dragged through the social media mud, which eats up company time and money and could cost the company current and future customers.
Just look at the “United Breaks Guitars” debacle. Canadian musician David Carroll released the hit song, ‘United Breaks Guitars’ on YouTube and iTunes about a bad customer service experience after his guitar had been broken on a United Airlines flight. And yes, this customer service nightmare did not just travel across the social media seas – it was talked about in the media and it is forever etched into Wikipedia history.
Measure. As with all contact center communication, there must be an infrastructure to measure the success of your social media communication plan. A system of ongoing measurement, analysis and adjustments optimizes the use of social media strategies. Call centers already have a long-standing tradition of measuring communication strategies, and inclusion of social media considerations is just as necessary.
Social media allows messages to be delivered conveniently and quickly – and consumers are demanding companies communicate with them based on their choices Companies and their employees are expected to be fluent in social media and capable of delivering messages to customers in its quick and convenient language. If you don't know how to Tweet, or get your point across in 140 characters or less, you need not apply. Call centers that neglect social media as a significant channel of customer communication and fail to develop a social media strategy will find themselves left behind.
About the Author
Mary Cook, Director of Contact Center Solutions for Varolii Corporation, provides enterprises with operational, contact center, and customer experience consulting services. With more than 17 years of experience, Mary has experience managing inbound and outbound call center operations, business process outsourcing operations, and large e-commerce operations, as well. Prior to Varolii, she was a Principal at The Call Center Intelligence Agency, providing expertise and interim management services for worldwide contact center operations for clients within the entertainment, communications, financial services, retail, and BPO industries. Prior to that, she spent 10 years managing contact center operations for iQor, AFNI, Kuehne + Nagel and FTD. She earned her bachelor’s degree in management and leadership from Judson University. She is also Six Sigma certified and has a Project Management certificate from Boston University. And, she is currently working on earning her MBA.
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