10 Reasons Why You Need to Improve Your Social Media Customer Service

Social media has made brands of all sizes more accessible than ever. Consumers can engage with brands literally any time they please on a variety of different social channels and for many businesses this is a blessing. However, as the great Spider-man once said, “with great power comes great responsibility.” With the power of being able to connect 24/7 with consumers on social media, brands have the responsibility of providing quality and timely customer service. Just how timely is timely? Well, 42% of customers said that they expect a response from a brand’s social media accounts within an hour. Hubshout recently published some great stats about why great customer service via social media is an absolute must these days. These stats just might blow your mind!

• 57% of customers think that a brand’s customer service response time should be the same on the weekdays and weekends.
• 32% of customers said that they expect a response from a brand within 30 minutes.
• 53% of people who engage with a brand on Twitter expect a response in 1 hour or less.
• 72% of customers said that they expect a response from a brand within an hour if they have a question or complaint.
• 38% of people reported having negative sentiments towards a brand who didn’t give them a timely response to their customer service issue on social media.
• 40% of customers who weren’t able to get their issue resolved ended up calling the company.
• 36% of customers said that they were able to get their issue resolved quickly.
• 62% of brands are replying to questions and comments on social media in 2013 opposed to 30% in 2012.
• 24 hours was the average Facebook response time of the Top 100 U.S. Retailers.
• 11 hours and 15 minutes was the average Twitter response time of the Top 100 U.S. Retailers.

Super-important Key Takeaways     

• A majority of brands are NOT doing a great job with customer service issues on social media. Monitor your pages as closely as you can and communicate when you might not be there to catch issues. If your communities expect you to be present, they will expect some customer service love. If you can’t dedicate yourself to 24/7 customer care, at least notify your community when someone will be available to assist.
• Most people go to social media BEFORE picking up the phone to complain. If you are slacking on your social media customer service, you can expect even angrier phone calls to the call center. Do your best to solve each issue in a timely manner.
• More and more people are turning to social media to learn about new brands and engage with old favorites. An angry customer or un-resolved customer service issue can be a terrible representation for your brand. Use every issue as an opportunity to demonstrate why people should choose you opposed to a competitor.

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