The competitive landscape today has forever been changed by the introduction of social media. The proliferation of technology coupled with platforms such as Facebook (News - Alert), LinkedIn, and Twitter are changing key business processes such as how sales, service, and support are approached within an organization. When combined with mobility trends, the demand for social CRM and mobile care accelerates.
The concept of social CRM and mobile care is all about going to your customer and interacting with them on their level, all while taking advantage of opportunities to shape perceptions and increase sales.
Social Customer Relationship Management (CRM) in combination with mobile care allows you to engage with your customers right where they are without making them have to come to you, according to this CIO report. Leveraging your customers’ preferred method of communication helps ensure profitability and can serve many other functions.
By providing easy access to social CRM and mobile care, customers are more able to find the solution they need without spending all day searching for it. This helps minimize frustration and solidifies your reputation in their mind. Companies would be wise to provide multiple channels for addressing customer queries – be it Facebook, your company website, etc, making it simpler for your customer to go about his or her day.
For those in the support and service industry, there is no downtime. Reps must be prepared to field inquiries both night and day. Often that means utilizing online self-support resources, which may provide quicker answers than waiting for a formal response from a member of the support staff.
It’s important to also identify your brand influencers – those that are plugging your services with active posts. Social CRM software allows this information to be stored and later reutilized upon the release of a new product to secure product testing and testimonials from those that are likely to cast your services in the most positive light.
Social CRM and mobile care provide organizations with the chance to address problems while they are still in their infancy – before they get blasted to the masses. By providing support teams with the opportunity to actively participate in brand monitoring in real-time, defects in particular products can be spotted early and can be corrected before they have a chance to fester.
Knowing who your experts are is a key part of providing effective social CRM and mobile care, and this can be accomplished through proper data mining techniques. After identifying your product enthusiasts, their posts can be tracked and issues then preemptively forwarded to the service team who will have the chance to develop a response before the customer even has time to report the issue.
Finally, it’s crucial not to underestimate the role that social CRM and mobile care plays in sales. Because of the higher level of engagement, those occupying these positions will exert more influence over customer perceptions and purchase decisions that anyone from the sales field ever will. Support staff has the unique opportunity to build relationships and improve loyalty, which can then be used for cross-selling or upselling at no cost to your company.
Want to learn more about the latest in communications and technology? Then be sure to attend ITEXPO West 2012, taking place Oct. 2-5, in Austin, TX. ITEXPO (News - Alert) offers an educational program to help corporate decision makers select the right IP-based voice, video, fax and unified communications solutions to improve their operations. It's also where service providers learn how to profitably roll out the services their subscribers are clamoring for – and where resellers can learn about new growth opportunities. For more information on registering for ITEXPO click here.
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Edited by Stefanie Mosca