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January 10, 2013

A Case Study:

A tremendous new customer service opportunity has emerged with the adoption of social media by consumers and the ability for companies to effectively track conversations about their brands. The emerging area of “social care” can be defined as the efforts employees make through social media to care for customers. Leading brands like Apple, Google and Dell are embracing the opportunity to provide customer support using dedicated social care channels. Analysts like Gartner predict that at least 35% of customer service centers will integrate some form of social capability by 2013.

Global contact center provider TELUS International has released a white paper detailing some of the best practices identified after studying leading consumer electronics companies’ social care strategies. Here are some of the key findings:

· Many companies are still at the early stages of developing the people, processes and technology to support social care.

· There is no consistent approach to social care among leading high-tech companies. Big brands are doing different things when it comes to social care. Each company has a unique approach to social care, ranging from:

o Apple’s strategy not to provide dedicated customer care in any social media channel beyond its own support forum;

o Dell’s and HP’s use of social channels for customer-to-customer support with little direct intervention;

o Best Buy’s extensive use of employees empowered to provide proactive social care via Twitter; and

o Google’s use of “how to” videos, taking advantage of rich media capabilities to provide customer support.

· Social care offers a clear opportunity for all companies.

o When evaluating sentiment – a measure of brand perception – social customer support can actually generate more positive sentiment than the overall brand sentiment. When done right, social care has the potential to boost and lead overall brand perception.

o Social care can be viewed as a brand building opportunity. There is a real opportunity to integrate social technology within a customer care environment.

· Best practices for launching a social care program have emerged among the benchmarked companies: build cross-functional teams, embrace the appropriate communications style for the channel, create a response map, follow through on conversations, and provide proactive social care where possible.

To download the TELUS International Social Media Customer Service white paper, click here.