With the emergence of social media in the last two decades, anyone can mention your business in a quick Tweet or Facebook post and BAM— it’s there for everyone on the web to see. Once you receive a notification that your company has been tagged, you have a golden opportunity to forge a relationship with a potential customer AND others that happen to see the interaction. As a business owner, it can be a headache to keep tabs on all online mentions and posts regarding your company. Monitoring all of your platforms is not easy to do without dedicating a good portion of your time to it. Beyond the time it takes, you need to create the most important aspects of how you respond to customers — your strategy. There are a few ways that you can approach this:
One of the most conservative social media strategies you can adopt for your online interactions is to respond to customers in a similar fashion, regardless of the comment. While this gives your business a more uniform online presence and doesn’t involve a monumental time investment, you run the risk of coming across as a robot and missing the opportunity to connect with a potential customer. If you reply to too many (or all) mentions/comments in the exact same way, people will think that you’re not even looking at their posts, just replying with a blanket response. Responding to everyone in exactly the same way should be avoided at all costs.
Do you remember high school when playing hard to get was a thing? Well, it’s back, but in response to online reviews and tweets. Maybe you’ve seen the “clapback tweets” from brands like Wendy’s or Digiorno, but they’ve taken the internet by storm in recent years. While they may seem cool, is it really a sustainable strategy long-term? The social media landscape changes so rapidly that this trend may not last, and has a high possibility of alienating your followers and potential customers. When you don’t have a giant audience, this social media strategy generally becomes too risky to be applicable to your business. Odds are this approach is not for you.
To make the most of all of your business’ interactions online, your best bet (especially as a smaller company) is to respond to customers in a personalized way. Getting a response that is positive and tailored exactly to them will stick with a potential buyer. Others that see the interaction will be more inclined to do business with you. You might be wondering “if this approach is so effective, why doesn’t everyone do it?” It’s because of one major resource – time. Unless you can set aside time to dedicate to social media strategy and implementation, you won’t be able to make the most out of your online responses and are therefore missing opportunities.
The easiest and most effective social media strategy that you can apply (especially if time is a constraint) is to have Alter Endeavors manage your company’s online presence. We have experience in digital marketing spanning a variety of industries. At the end of the day, having Alter Endeavors manage your social media presence frees you from checking your business’ platforms multiple times a day and ensures nothing falls through the cracks. Your input helps us create the most effective social media strategy possible for your business, and we will respond to every mention, review, post, or tweet referencing your company in a personalized and professional way.
A mention on social media is an opportunity to forge a relationship. It’s imperative that your business is taking advantage of these opportunities by replying in a way that shines a positive light on your brand — even in response to criticism! If you’re not 100% comfortable responding to any potential post about your company, give Alter Endeavors a call. We’ll work with you every step of the way to create a personalized response strategy for your brand and ensure that your presence online is uniform and professional.