How Can You Use Social Media for Customer Service?

Social media is in all of our lives, and it’s in our business too. Navigating how to use social media for customer service will provide new ways to reach out to, connect with and learn about your customers.

We explore some of the key utilities of social media for your business, enabling you to be making the most of your marketing. This guide can teach you that social media is not just a chore, but a vital tool for any business to embrace.

Brand Exposure

A first impression is everything. Make sure to make more impressions, and the right impressions, through using social media as a way to get your name out there. The reasons are simple: generate leads and sales and drive traffic to your website.

A particular advantage of social media is that it can be effective while inexpensive – after all, anyone can own an account. ‘Organic growth’ is what marketers refer to as growth produced without any paid promotion; all it costs is time. Alternatively, paying for advertising will lead to better quality content reaching a broader audience than you can achieve by yourself.

While social media platforms are increasingly overlapping, it is important to consider how social media platforms offer unique audiences and activities.

Connect with Stakeholders

The main audience that you need to connect with is your customers (and potential customers). There are different ways to achieve this, such as posting an update or announcement and, as small businesses especially benefit from, using direct messages (DMs) as a way to receive and respond to customer feedback.

However, there are a variety of other stakeholders to reach out to. Use LinkedIn as a way to connect with partners, clients and – along with job sites – as a recruitment tool. Join Facebook Groups to stay informed within a sector or region and have your say.

Satisfying Customer Expectations

By now, customers expect a social media presence. Meeting this expectation is important to ensure that a customer can take your company seriously and find out the information that they require.

Posts and stories can also be useful ways to provide customers with information and updates. General information can be distributed quickly, while key details such as event dates can be communicated along with any other outreach methods to maximise the reception of the message.

Using it as a Learning Tool

Use insights and analytic tools to see what content gets the most engagement, so that you can better understand your audience’s interests. Learn how to optimise the timings of your posts so that you can maximise brand exposure. See breakdowns in your followers and visitors to gain valuable knowledge about who your audience is.

By using social media as a learning tool, you can learn a wealth of information about general trends or specific individuals that can inform your business strategies. The better you can understand your audience, the better you can provide for them.