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Many companies today are looking at social media and taking a "me too" approach. They start a Twitter® account because of the current popularity in social media and then ask "OK, now what and why did I just do that?" Not only can this first step make a business more social, it can help improve its customer and internal communications.
In most businesses—besides mom-and-pop shops where the owner knows everyone who comes through the door—a disconnect exists between the customer and the business. Before social media, the only constant interaction a customer had with a business was with a logo. But the logo can't do what that small, family-owned business can; it can't speak to customers directly, it also can't personally recognize customer complaints. And it can't recommend products and services.
By making a company more social, a personal and interactive bond can be restored between the customer and the business. On Twitter, a business might start an exclusive promotion for followers, the kind of deal a mom-and-pop shop would offer its loyal customers. These promotions could be a range of offers, from discounts on goods and services to freebies just for stopping by a store or ordering online with a special code. Offering these deals gives social media users who follow your business a reason to keep following.
The conversation in social media doesn't stop with promotions. Businesses can use social media as an extension of customer service and feedback as well. Once organizations start offering special deals to customers who follow them, customers may respond with questions or feedback. And, just like the mom-and-pop shop, it's just as important to respond to customers' concerns as quickly and personally as possible. This process will give your business a more tangible personality, allowing it to become more social while opening up an interactive communication channel with customers.
Making a business more social doesn't have to end with how customer communication is handled. Going back to the mom-and-pop shop example, these small businesses have few employees and if an employee has a question that he doesn't know, there's only one place he can go to get the information: the boss/owner.
In larger businesses, finding out who has the actual answers can be challenging because there are so many people who might have only pieces of the information needed. So, why not keep making a business more social by bringing the real-time communications of social media to internal communications?
For large companies, Twitter may not be appropriate due to security concerns, but other services such as Yammer and Present.ly function like Twitter, but are designed for businesses. These services make an organization's internal communications more social by allowing users to send and receive short messages that are limited in character length and by the special permissions given by the company.
This kind of social media tool benefits a company by streamlining internal communications. Employees can access a quick and familiar system in which they ask short questions and get real-time answers within project management or company groups. This private, and more social, internal communications system doesn't flood email inboxes, the posts support file attachments, plus it's secure and posted to the group in real time.
Social media, done correctly, can make businesses more personable and help alleviate communication problems within a company. While it may be hard for a large business to get the same kind of interaction as the neighborhood mom-and-pop shop, through social media, the business can make itself more than just a logo—and improve internal and external relations as a more social company.
Twitter is a registered trademark of Twitter Inc.
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