Just as brands need consumers to purchase their goods and services to stay afloat in today's competitive market, social networks would be nothing more than online ghost towns without the people who populate these pages with their thoughts and experiences. But, while social media offers consumers an outlet for their opinions, such channels also open up the opportunity to build relationships that exist beyond the company's traditional offerings and cultivate the strong trust and loyalty behind brand advocacy.
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I spent the past two days at the Corporate Social Media Summit in New York City, hearing from companies like Dunkin' Donuts, Chobani, Adobe, General Mills and others about how they have built and continue to build their social media strategies. While every speaker provided insight on how to maximize each social channel- what made my heart skip a tweet was Adobe Director of Strategy Jeff Feldman's concept that social doesn't equal social networks. What a groundbreaking concept for this
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Facebook has revolutionized the way consumers interact with friends, family, and brands. But, just as these shoppers have incorporated the social network into their daily routines, companies must also work to make social media an integral part of their customer strategy. For Migros, winner in the Social and Mobile Engagement category of this year's Gartner & 1to1 Media CRM Excellence Awards (EMEA/APAC region), Facebook now represents the key component behind the brand's interactive loyalty program.
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I recently came across an interview with Amazon Chairman and CEO Jeff Bezos, in which he was quoted this: "What's dangerous is not to evolve...You have to have a willingness to fail.... It's not enough to just listen to customers; you have to invent on their behalf."
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"If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all." Mothers may be fountains of wisdom, but in today's social world, Facebook and Twitter encourage many to rebel against the astute words of yesteryear. Though many bite their tongue in person, they rush to social media to vent their frustration, as offline interactions become online conversations. But, as Simon Palmer, chief technology officer at Empathica, highlights, negative feedback that can be used to uncover areas of weakness
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Technology continues to evolve each day, but unlike children, we do not document this growth with pencil marks on our doorframe. We measure technology's lifecycle through tweets, apps, and upgrades. But, just as teenagers test their boundaries, technology frequently pushes the envelope when it comes to innovation and creativity. In Huggies' case, the latest gimmick truly hits below the belt.
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There's a distinct difference between hearing and listening. While most companies hear what their customers are saying about the brand via social media, very few truly listen to the problems at the core of customer sentiment so they may act upon such feedback to improve experience. Social insight presents companies with an interesting and educational look into how customers interact with and perceive the brands they do business with, yet most companies remain at the starting stages of strategic expansion,
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While social networks have been around since the now forgotten days of MySpace and Friendster, today's most popular sites continue to gain momentum as social media evolves. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Pinterest have grown into engagement platforms that allow consumers to interact with their friends, family, and favorite brands regularly. But, as these social interactions begin to blossom, companies have begun to value and utilize social tools as part of their customer care efforts.
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The success of marketers everywhere is increasingly tied to the use of analytics and Big Data, with the goal of correlating campaign success to real business results. No longer are marketing departments simply thought of as creative machines, as their responsibilities now reach a broadening scope of channels and tasks that range from tying social media success to business ROI and delivering mobile messaging where it matters most in the customer's buying journey.
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Just one week ago, as white smoke billowed from the Sistine Chapel, millions of people took to Twitter to express their joy and excitement over the election of Pope Francis. With nearly 130,000 tweets per minute, citizens across the globe welcomed the new pope, the first elected since the advent of the smartphone, the tablet, and Twitter. But it wasn't until the smoke cleared that we could finally see technology's impact on our lives in just eight short years.
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Gone are the days when the average tourist wandered around with a paper map in one hand and a camera around their neck. Thanks to smartphones, these travelers can carry a world of maps and their trusty camera right in their back pocket. But for those popular attractions and tourist destinations that recognize this change in behavior, mobile devices have the ability to engage visitors in an entirely new way.
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If you peruse the shelves of your favorite store, what you see isn't necessarily all you can get. Through DailyGrommet.com, creators have an opportunity to share their concepts and products--those that have yet to enter the mainstream retail world--with consumers through the website's product launch platform. DailyGrommet.com provides individuals with the chance to share their innovative, unique creations with their robust, "citizen commerce" community. But, while users were once limited to phone, email, or Web submissions, creators and consumers now
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Ever since the emergence of digital, much has been written and discussed about bridging the social/mobile and traditional marketing divide by getting a handle on Big Data and ultimately having the ability to understand and respond to consumers' ever-changing needs and behaviors.
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Delta proved last week that it must have learned a thing or two from United Airlines' lack of response in 2008 to now famed passenger David Carroll when a flight crew broke his guitar after tossing it, prompting him to record "United Breaks Guitars." The song launched him into an Internet sensation and made him the poster boy for the power of social media when customers are wronged.
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It's that time of year again, when predictions, trends, and resolutions articles come out of the woodwork to help guide our expectations for the coming year. At 1to1 Media, we've included a few of our own around the customer experience.
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Though the "end of the world" looms, none of us will know whether the Mayan predictions hold true until Friday. But, even if Saturday comes and life continues as usual, there's no reason we shouldn't have a little fun as we fight our potential fate. For JELL-O, this means appeasing the Mayan gods with the "funnest" sacrifice--JELL-O Pudding.
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Like Thanksgiving and Black Friday, Cyber Monday has become an annual "holiday" for consumers who seek online sales in an effort to avoid crowded stores and to find better deals. Research from BIGinsight for the National Retail Federation estimates an even bigger turnout today compared to last year, with an estimated 129.2 million Americans shopping online, compared to 122.8 million this time last year.
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Crunched for time, short on cash flow, and often understaffed, small business owners in the past have largely ignored social media channels as a way to market their business and engage customers. In fact, in August of last year, eMarketer polled 304 small business decision-makers, and 64 percent of them said social media was either unnecessary or something about which they didn't have an opinion.
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Transformative leaders are obsessed with innovation, employee culture, and customer-centric strategies--they put the company culture and customers before anything else. True innovation, however, not only requires having a vision for change, but also the tools and solutions integration to enable it.
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Though natural disasters can leave the population feeling powerless, weak in our inability to control the elements, we continue to sustain our resolve, standing together stronger than ever. While Hurricane Sandy devastated millions of Americans on the east coast, ravaging communities up and down the seaboard, we have weathered the storm hand-in-hand, leveraging our ability to communicate as the prime tool for preventing harm and aiding victims promptly and proactively.
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When engaging in social media, "likes" don't always equal loyalty. Many companies have come to realize that true customer loyalty and engagement takes more than sending promotions to solicit "likes."
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When consumers encounter poor mobile phone service, most tend to shake their device in hope of regaining reception. But, when consumers receive poor customer service, shaking a live agent is simply out of the question (and physically impossible, too). With expectations high, customers look for service that solves their problem in a timely, efficient fashion. No matter the channel--email, social, phone, or Web--customer service has become the key driver behind customer satisfaction at all stages of the consumer lifecycle.
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Customer centricity is often associated with steps that companies in the private sector can take to build closer relationships with their customers and to deliver products, services, and experiences that are designed with the customer in mind. But customer centricity doesn't just apply to the business world. As a Peppers & Rogers Group white paper points out, a growing number of governments, associations, and non-profits around the world are adopting best practices from the business community and designing citizen-centric offerings
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Bridging silos and bringing together data that's hosted in different repositories is a priority for many organizations which want better visibility into their customer data, allowing them to gain better insights on which to base business decisions.
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Over the weekend, Mercedes-Benz UK test-drove the first-ever TV-to-Twitter crossover, putting The X Factor viewers behind the metaphorical wheel. To promote their 2013 A-Class line, Mercedes created a 3-part series of commercial advertisements, encouraging viewers to tweet using the #YOUDRIVE hashtag.
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This week marks the start of the official 2012 TV season where networks will introduce a bevy of new comedies and dramas with the hope of attracting the magic number of viewers sufficient enough to get the green light on a second season.
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Because of the recession, the average consumer has become increasingly pocket conscious. Since 2008, couponing has seen a 27 percent increase, and with the proliferation of social channels, many brands are beginning to transition their offers from print to digital. While coupons were once pieces of paper clipped from inserts in the weekend paper, connected consumers can print offers online and access coupons on their smartphones, erasing scissors from the equation and putting social media at the center instead.
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Social media is offering new ways for organizations not only to reach out to their customers, but also to allow these clients to promote their favorite brands among their social networks. A number of organizations are finding innovative ways to engage with their customers while at the same time promoting themselves over social channels.
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There's an interesting discussion going on among contact center professionals on a LinkedIn group based on the following question: "Which of the following technologies do you believe will have the most impact on customer service within the next 5 years?" The choices include: • Mobile Customer Service Apps • Virtual Agents • Video • Agent Desktop Technology
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The 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver represented early days for streaming video and mobile. In fact, Steve Jobs unveiled the iPad only a couple weeks prior to the start of the 2010 Games.
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Customers today have numerous opportunities to interact with brands at a variety of touchpoints. Therefore it's critical for companies to leverage such opportunities to engage with customers and build an emotional connection. A growing number of companies are realizing that engagement goes beyond just listening to customers across multiple channels, but also empowering them to advocate for their brands--both through online and offline.
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There's been no shortage of discussion lately about how challenging it is to be a CMO. Among the issues faced by CMOs is the ability to effectively manage marketing efforts across various channels that companies use to interact with customers. Siloed channel data makes it particularly tough for CMOs and other decision-makers to gain a complete view of customers and their behaviors across different channels as well as their transactions, preferences, and potential needs. The desire among CMOs and other
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A great product is no longer serving as a differentiator for companies. Customers have come to expect great products and services and are making purchase decisions based on the experience that organizations deliver.
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We spend too much time looking at screens. We bounce from our phones, to our computers, to our televisions, absorbing commercials, tweets, and status updates ad infinitum. "Windows" have taken on an entirely new meaning. This overwhelming flood of information keeps us glued to these rectangular boxes day in and day out.
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Social media has revolutionized the way customers learn about the organizations they do business with. In fact customers are becoming more likely to trust the recommendations of strangers rather than brand adverts. How often do you research a company online before making a purchase? I do it constantly and the proliferation of smartphones is only making this quest for pre-purchase information easier. This means that organizations are under increased pressure to deliver optimal service to each and every customer.
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In an ever-changing world customers are taking control. But rather than being daunting for organizations, this shift presents an opportunity for customer service leaders to step up and give their customers a voice, Citibank senior vice president of social media Frank Eliason believes. In his recently published book @ Your Service, Eliason writes about the importance of keeping customers at the core of the organization and always being prepared to be there to serve their needs. In an interview with
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One of the biggest problems with contact centers is the inordinate amount of focus that's placed on efficiency. Many agents are instructed and incented to close out calls quickly, often without fully resolving a customer's issue or delivering a satisfactory experience. Last week while I attended Call Center Week in Las Vegas, I came across an example of where customer service should be headed.
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It can be difficult to predict the value of delivering customer service and support via social, according to Gartner Research Vice President Jeff Mann. It's easier to show the value once a company starts using social for customer service, Mann said during his presentation today at the Gartner Customer Strategies & Technologies Summit 2012 in London. In a few cases, he said, companies forced to respond to a major customer outcry via social discovered significant benefits and created formal
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It takes a lot to stand out in the business world. And when it comes to customer centricity, it's even harder. Customer expectations are higher than ever, and there are many organizational and market challenges to creating and maintaining a truly customer-focused organization. That's why it's important to recognize those companies that make it work with the Gartner & 1to1 Media CEM Excellence Awards.
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Opportunity often knocks one customer at a time. That's the beauty of social. If you can use social monitoring to cut through the clutter, you'll find opportunities to engage with customers on an individual level--and not just to resolve complaints. Listening to customers in social channels also presents opportunities to provide information and advice that builds goodwill and helps to maintain loyalty. We've all heard the stories about Best Buy and Zappos.
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Social has brought transparency to consumers never before possible. The information that consumers share about companies and that companies reveal about themselves is presenting new opportunities for B2C companies to build and maintain, or rebuild, customer trust--or to lose it in the blink of an eye in one gigantic, public flameout.
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Social media strategy is a topic that's front and center on almost every executive's mind. Everyone knows the social world is a critical channel for marketing, sales, and customer service. However, there is no silver bullet or how-to manual for success in the social sphere. The complexity of the space is represented visually in this infographic from Buddy Media that has gone viral.
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Organizations want to know what their customers think about them and what they can do to improve their customers' experience. This is even more important in a competitive environment and in the age of social media where customers are very quick to share their opinions. But in their zeal to get information, some organizations are overloading their customers with numerous surveys that have an exhaustive list of questions, potentially alienating them from giving their insight. And with more customers providing
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During childhood, we learn in a group atmosphere. Just as we learned to socialize while also developing necessary life skills, businesses must now cultivate their social skills in order to learn how to best serve their customers.
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Social media is like the new cool kid on the block: Everyone wants to be its friend, but they're all worried of mishandling it and end up doing more harm than good. Although many marketers are trying to leverage social media to get close to both customers and prospects, this relatively new medium is not about likes and fans, but about engaging with people.
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In today's business environment of declining consumer trust and heightened social communication, organizations no longer control how their brand is perceived. Welcome to the Age of the Customer. Gone are the days that brands controlled their image strictly through marketing collateral and advertisements. The advent of social media has fundamentally changed the way that customers seek and share information. Today's customers access information through a variety of channels and are quick to share feedback with their communities, both online
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Today's customers are no longer bowled over by a great advertisement unless it targets them individually, giving them information that's relevant to them. This puts extra pressure on organizations to develop marketing campaigns that aren't just captivating, but also give added value.
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1to1 Media's Tom Hoffman speaks with Nikhil Govindaraj, Vice President of Products at Moxie Software, about different ways that companies can monitor and act on customers' social media comments to provide timely and proactive support when it appears to be needed.
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After attending Forrester's Marketing Leadership Forum last week, I came away with two realizations: 1. Marketers are getting serious about leveraging conversations about their brands in social networks, and 2. Because many marketers are jumping in without a clear strategy about how social fits in with other customer touchpoints, data silos are proliferating.
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1to1 Media's Tom Hoffman speaks with Udi Ziv, President of NICE Systems' Enterprise Group, about approaches for striking a balance between using customer sentiment in social media while protecting customer privacy.
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It seems that everyone now has a Twitter, Facebook, Google+, and any other alphabet soup social media account you can think of. And rabid social media "experts" are calling for every C-level executive to embrace social media as part of their new commitment to transparency.
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Social media and mobile phones have changed the way many people view the world. But the impact hasn't solely been on connectivity, as social channels and text messages gave rise to new ways of communication using text. The prevalence in text-based communication has increased the popularity of chat for customer service use, according to Jeremy Sokolic, senior vice president of marketing at LivePerson. "Text-based communication has become second nature," he said during a recent conversation.
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Customer strategists today face an ever-increasing plethora of challenges across every aspect of the customer experience. While attending the Gartner Customer 360 Summit in Orlando, I asked a number of industry insiders to share their opinions and advice on four of the many hot topics facing customer experience professionals right now. Find out what they had to say:
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Social media is an enigma to many executives. Its prevalence can't be denied and all companies should use it as a critical interaction channel. Sites like Facebook, Twitter, Foursqure, Pinterest and others take away the barriers to direct interaction with customers and prospects. The challenge comes from using social media in a strategic way that has a financial impact, not just as a "nice to have" initiative. Many companies are looking for best practices in how to best use social
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While social media alone creates buzz around your brand, it's gamification that drives engagement across your online community. That's why many enterprise marketers are turning to gamification to measure and influence consumer behavior on their brand-owned Web and mobile sites. By accessing behavior metrics and understanding customers' specific actions that are tied to key business objectives, you can determine how individual users are interacting with your site's content and what drives customer engagement with your brand. This knowledge can be
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