How to Turn that Customer into an Evangelist

New customers have a tendency to evolve through three phases once they decide to buy from you.

Initially they feel very excited about their decision, before going through a learning curve where they may struggle with blending in your products/services.

Finally, they begin to experience the value that you provide and the relationship settles down and finds its own balance.

Phase 2 can be a potentially vulnerable time for a sales person, because without the benefit of an established track record, and in the face of possible problems – no matter how minor, this is the time when most newly acquired customers are apt to change their mind.

4 Examples of Excellent Twitter Customer Service

#1: JetBlue Excels in Responsiveness

Airline delays are one of the most common causes of customer frustration. Not only do delays happen often, but also people are pretty vocal about their feelings when their flight is delayed.

Acknowledging this, @JetBlue ensures they’re responsive to their customers because they understand it’s important for continued customer loyalty. Not only do theyengage with happy customers, but they also respond to and help frustrated customers as quickly as possible.

JetBlue assisting a frustrated customer.

Sure, a lot of airlines do this now. What makes JetBlue stand out from its competitors?

JetBlue is known to be extremely responsive to customers mentioning their brand. Whether they send a public @reply or a private DM to answer a question, they are quick to interact. As seen in the picture above, they reached out to their frustrated customer within the hour.

Key takeaway: Respond quickly.

Twitter is a channel where customers expect quick responses. As a result, you’ll likely want to respond to mentions and inquiries quickly. Many companies dedicate full-time employees to the task of responding to customers and potential customers on Twitter. Make sure you have a social media plan in place to satisfy customers.

You might also want to consider having a plan in place for crises or when the volume of inquiries on Twitter are higher than expected. For example, in JetBlue’s case, bad weather may require that others from the company step in and help with the demand.

#2: Nike’s Separate Handle

@NikeSupport is a prime example of customer service done well. They constantlyrespond to followers on Twitter, whether it’s about their apparel, Fuel Band or other products. Every few minutes, you can watch them respond to someone new.

What makes this remarkable? Nike is a huge company. They have many different types of sports equipment and lines of apparel that make up their brand. While Nike manages a number of Twitter handles to accommodate followers interested in specific sports or store locations, @NikeSupport is dedicated solely to responding to customers who need help.

As you can see from the images below, Nike Support has tweeted over 160K times, whereas the Nike handle has only tweeted around 11K times.

Nike Twitter handle.

Nike Support Twitter handle.

Key takeaway: Make it easy.

While creating your social media strategy, think about your customers and how you can make getting help easy for them. Remember, in addition to losing a customer through poor customer service, you can also lose customers when you make things too complicated.

By having a single Twitter handle dedicated to answering all customer service questions, you make the lives of your customers much easier. It’s all about customer delight!

#3: Seamless Around-the-Clock Customer Service

It is no longer a 9-5 world—especially when it comes to social media—and some companies need to be available at all hours.

Seamless is an online food ordering service that serves customers in several time zones across the United States and in London. There’s always someone ordering food and eating, right?

In addition to engaging customers through trivia questions with prizes of free food, they also provide customer service around the clock.

Seamless responds to an issue at 10:50 AM.

Seamless responds to an issue at 4:46 PM.

Key takeaway: Manage your presence.

Consider your business model. Are there specific times of the day or night you need to be available? Should you be available at all hours? If you set automatic tweets throughout the night, do you also need to respond to replies and questions? You want to carefully consider the hours you are present on Twitter and be there when you’re needed. Global companies need to satisfy customers who are in the same city as the headquarters, as well as customers who are halfway across the globe.

#4: Comcast’s Quality Assistance

While speed of response is important, many companies underestimate the importance of quality assistance. A quick response that isn’t helpful can be as good as no response at all. In the case of Comcast, their customers are looking for specific help to fix their problems. If their wireless Internet isn’t working, they want to know how to fix it. If their television connection is out, they want to know how to repair whatever is broken.

To provide each customer with a timely and helpful response, Comcast’s Twitter account is managed by a team of people who can quickly offer technical support and troubleshooting tactics for a variety of issues.

@ComcastCares responds to issue.

Key takeaway: Provide appropriate knowledge.

If your customers are likely to contact you with technical issues, it may make sense tostaff your Twitter team with knowledgeable personnel who can answer technical questions quickly and accurately.

Give careful consideration to who is answering the questions your customers are asking on Twitter.

Integrate Customer Service Into Your Company’s Social Accounts

These examples show how to use Twitter to cultivate loyalty by providing timely and helpful responses to customers.

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What is Branding (and How Does Your Business Do It?)

What is Branding? And what can we learn from how customers interact with brands today? Most marketers have never thought of digital as a space to build a brand. But branding is everything in today’s digital world; and digital branding experiences is a recurring business. It never hurts to make a good impression, but for brands to remain relevant in the digital era, it’s much better to find a way to engage with customers than to talk at them. Engagement creates customers--not just through social media, but across the entire digital channel. Whether a customer is entering a contest, “liking” a brand on Facebook, or even watching a video on YouTube—brand engagement increases awareness and sales. Here are five ways to create effective branding for your business. 

Develop a Brand Voice: All businesses need a brand presence to get, keep and build your customer base. The first step is to use word-of-mouth advertising to drive awareness and traffic to your social media pages. Share your expertise to enhance your reputation and build credibility.

Highlight a key benefit: What differentiates your product or service from that of your competitors? If you have an advantage over your competitors, or if your product or service has a unique benefit, you need to use it. Figure our what your top features are, what type of content resonates with your audience, and highlight them to target potential customers, raise awareness and get attention.

Be Engaging: To make an impact, your brand needs to be engaging. Providing a customer experience is about having a dialogue. Respond to people talking about you and your brand. Start and join conversations. Be authentic, genuine and real. When you have a dialogue with a customer or prospect, the more likely your customers and prospective clients will perceive you as an approachable and personable brand.

Be Transparent: Be truthful and honest, even when it’s difficult or inconvenient. When you maintain an open dialogue with your customers and keep them informed at all times, you’ll earn your customer’s trust and commitment to your company. When you show that you’re supporting the customer, you’ll build a network of supporters that will impact your business.

Keep Your Brand Memorable: You never get a second chance to make a good first impression. Some customers look to digital brand experiences for customer service. So when a customer contacts your business, make sure you provide service with a smile. Listen and support the customer so they know you sincerely care about their needs. If you want to take it a step further, reward the customer by developing specific campaigns so you can retain the most valuable ones. 

Adding it all up, it quickly becomes obvious that customer brand engagement creates customers. The best companies today understand that we are living in an era where a customer’s perception of a brand isn’t formed in reaction to a message, but through a series of experiences over time. Ultimately, it’s a dialogue of interactions that’s stunningly effective when done right. As Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s CEO, has been known to say: “Your brand is formed primarily, not by what your company says about itself, but what the company does.” Branding not only matters - it drives results to the bottom line.

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