Tag Archives: business owners

The Lelong.my E-Commerce Fair 2011 and A Social Media Experiment

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The last couple of weeks has been nothing but busy, followed by a major downtime of my site caused by some rather irritating server problems but I’m glad that they are all sorted out now and I can finally go back to my blogging routine.

team managing the e-commerce fair

I recently launched an event for a client (Lelong.my) which is also Malaysia’s first E-Commerce Fair held at one of the busiest exhibition centres in Malaysia – the Mid Valley Exhibition Centre. The event lasted for 3 days over the weekend with the main objective to highlight the E-Commerce industry in Malaysia and to educate consumers on the convenience of E-Commerce.

Before you go about wondering why an event of such nature is required, consumers in Malaysia generally are not very comfortable with online purchases and the limitation of payment services makes things worse. However the E-Commerce scene in Malaysia is slowly picking up over the recent years which led to Lelong.my’s decision in bringing the online experience offline for all to see.

paypal at lelong e-commerce fair

The event brought online retail businesses from electronics, books, gadgets, fashion apparels, home appliances and etc together along with various support industries such as payment gateway giant – PayPal, web hosting providers, shopping cart solutions and more. By doing so, consumers are now able to find out more about such services and get started right there and then, ultimately mass educating many who were clueless about e-commerce.

e commerce talks at e commerce fair

As a whole, the event attracted over 60,000 visitors throughout the 3-day event with over a million impressions online across various platforms including blogs, Facebook updates and tweets plus complementary press write-ups on several local newspapers.

A Social Experiment at the Event

Being myself, I thought it would be great to put to see if social media is effective for a corporate consumer event in Malaysia. A part from the usual online promotional campaigns using Facebook (which was well received), I tested the usage of Twitter and Foursquare, two platforms that aren’t as big as Facebook in Malaysia.

The experiment is simple and it comes in 2 different parts:

Part 1: Using Foursquare to target existing Foursquare users.

A new venue is created on Foursquare prior to the event (without any specials) just to test the popularity of checking in. The results?

simple foursquare experimentIt didn’t cook up a storm but the results are rather interesting. The newly created venue managed to bring in 24 check-ins (with a mayor crowned) and 1 tip from a visitor within the 3-days as compared to the venue’s other check-ins (Hall 1, Hall 2 and Hall 3) which have been created at least a year ago.

This suggests that visitors are more inclined to check-in to an event compared to a location (like the exhibition centre) even when there are no specials to be given away.

Part 2: Using Twitter’s location based search to target tweeps within the area.

We closely monitored users that were checking in to the Mid Valley Megamall and those that are tweeting within the vicinity of the venue and sent them an invitation to check out the e-commerce fair at the exhibition centre.

tweeting at the e commerce fair

While the temporary Twitter handle only received a handful of followers, the invitation sparked conversations among interested tweeps and we were able to share the event with many others.

What does this mean for other corporate consumer events in Malaysia?

  1. Facebook reaches the consumers at a larger scale in Malaysia as compared to other social platforms
  2. Foursquare specials have the potential to be an attraction or incentive for visitors to come by (or just to check-in)
  3. Twitter is a good tool to create conversations, create interest and responding to feedbacks
  4. Twitter’s location based search allows you to capitalize on the crowd that is already in the vicinity. You just need to give them a reason to come by.
  5. You should not rely on one social platform alone. Consider other platforms to reach out to other pockets of consumers as each tool have their individual strengths and audiences.

What are your thoughts on utilizing social media as part of an event’s marketing mix? Any ideas to spice things up?

Note that the experiments were done on an as-it-is basis with its conclusions drawn from a personal perspective only.

Brand Focus #7: 3 Common Social Media Integration Mistakes in Your Marketing Campaigns [Friso Malaysia]

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I was flipping through the local papers recently and this particular advertisement caught my attention:

social media branding in malaysia - friso

It was a full color, full page advertisement by Friso Malaysia to promote a new baby product. What caught my attention was the “Womb Scan T-Shirt” that they are giving away with every purchase of their new product. Notice anything yet? The t-shirt has an augmented reality (AR) code printed on it.

As the usage of AR is very low in Malaysia, I was curious to find out how are they putting it to work especially by integrating social media and having that said, I decided to give the ad a try by visiting the printed website.

Mistake #1: An Unfriendly Form

I wasn’t surprised to face a registration form as most businesses do the same anyway which is a smart thing to do to build your database. However, having every single field marked as ‘required’ is a pain. On top of that, they had fields that does not relate to me but I had to fill in anyway e.g. child’s details, full address and even my identification card number. The outcome? I filled in false information simply because: 1) I don’t have a child and 2) Why does your business want my identification card number?

What can you do: If you’re preparing a form, make sure you cater to the different needs of your potential visitors. Identify what is most important to your business – would just having the name, email address, gender and DOB suffice? Remember, you do not want to put your visitors off by having an extensive form. You can always request for further details later.

Mistake #2: Relying on One Source for Traffic

Although it sounds like common sense to have your campaign blasted in as many areas as possible, it is interesting to see big brands such as Friso missing the mark. A simple visit to their official Facebook page revealed that they have made little mention to the AR campaign which made me wonder – were they relying only on press ads? How are they getting people to participate? How else are they integrating social media into this campaign?

What can you do: Have as many engagement points as possible. Putting all your eggs into one basket will not only limit your campaign’s potential and reach, but also suggests wastage of resources simply because it could’ve been better.

One thing cool about Friso is that they have a rather active customer base on Facebook where there are decent amount of interactions taking place. This also brings me to..

Mistake #3: Under Utilizing Existing Networks

Friso Malaysia owns a Facebook page with more than 30,000 fans and your business may already have an engaging network of consumers which is great. Why not use them to be advocates for your marketing campaigns? If they are already actively interacting with you, there is a good chance that they’ll be more than happy to get the word out for you. Get your network involved! Find ways to get them excited and to share their experience with you. This will not only get the word out, it gets your customers involved and allows new customers to understand you better.

What can you do: Get existing customers to share their experience with the campaign. It can be as simple as allowing them to share their stories in a forum, post a picture of them interacting with the augmented reality projection or even to produce a short video clip on how they are feeling in their pregnancy.

Bonus Mistake: Selling too Soon!

I’m not against selling. After all, you’ve spent X amount of $$ to get the campaign up, you need some sort of returns, right? However, depending on what platform your campaign is hosted on, you may want to consider holding your horses when it comes to selling – especially if you’re using a new platform such as AR in Malaysia. I was presented with the sales message when I was trying hard to get the below image projection to work and I was given no means to close it apart from refreshing the page. Are they selling too soon?

social media branding - friso malaysia
What can you do: Identify when is the best time to sell. If you’ve already got a subscription / membership system up, perhaps sending a follow-up email after would be a better idea, AFTER they’ve tried out what you have to offer. Creating a positive experience is always better than pushing a sale.

What do you think marketing campaigns today are lacking in social media integration efforts? Let’s compare notes in the comments! :)

Have You Replaced Your Wipers for #SocialMedia?

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Have you ever drove in a heavy downpour with a faulty wiper? Not so much of it being broken, but not able to give your windscreen a clean wipe – especially at night. If you haven’t, it looks something like this:
driving with bad vision on social media

Without going further, let me tell you that I’ve been driving in this condition for quite sometime. I know I can easily change the wiper blades but somehow it is always not worth the hassle and it didn’t seem like it would rain! When it does, I find me telling myself that I can handle it since I’m experienced.

How often do we have the same thought? We choose to stick to our current condition just because it is a hassle or inconvenient to change. In fact, we may think that we’re good at it – because we’ve ‘trained’ under the same situation for numerous times.

Change your social media wiper blades!

Why should you?

#1: Your vision is greatly limited

It never is a good thing when your vision is limited – especially when you’re driving. The same goes to managing your social media presence. You may be aware that you need a social media strategy for your business and it is true; but it takes more than just strategy for you to make social media work for you. You must be able to see what lies ahead of you and adapt to change and requirements because social media is about people, and people change. They can pull their brakes causing you to crash right into them because you just couldn’t see it coming.

What can you do: Always be on a look out for signs. Know what your competitors are doing. Know what you target audience are looking for. Be aware of the latest happenings especially when it comes to marketing. You do not want to be last on board the next Facebook.

#2: You drive a LOT slower

The heavier the rain, the slower you get. Many times businesses fail to integrate social media into their marketing strategy because they are stubborn. They are determined to drive forward relentlessly despite the heavy rain – which is not necessarily a good thing. Sure, it can be rewarding when you get to your destination but you may have taken much more time and exhausted much more energy than usual.

What can you do: Sometimes it is better to stop by the road to re-plan your journey with a clearer vision. Maybe you’re using the wrong route or the wrong tools to begin with. Could it be that your prospects aren’t even on Twitter?

#3: You max out your level of concentration

It takes great effort and strength to remain focused over a long period of time. Imagine driving in that condition for an hour or more – it’ll suck your life dry because you’re simply trying to make vision out of no vision. Don’t get me wrong, concentration is great and your determination is plausible but don’t you want to use that for the right purpose? You may be putting all your effort into the wrong area – whether by trying too hard to keep up with trends, emulating A-list bloggers or even digging deep for followers.

What can you do: Concentrate where it matters the most for you. It can be producing quality content, engaging with fellow bloggers from the industry, participating in tweet chats to build your networks or listening to what your customers have to say – social media isn’t social anymore if you’re too focused on the numbers.

Imagine…

clear vision on social media Driving down the road with 100% clear vision with a perfect set of wiper blades. You now can drive normally, yet enjoy the journey by perhaps turning up the music and humming away to your next destination.

It’s time to replace that wiper blades of yours for a new one.

p.s. I’ve finally replaced my car’s wiper blades!

Brand Focus #5: Groupon in Malaysia – Friend or Foe for Your Business?

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will groupon help businesses grow?It has been a couple of months now since Groupon officially came into Malaysia by acquiring GroupsMore.com and many businesses have hopped unto what I call the Groupon hype – a similar scene happening around the world. Businesses go on Groupon for marketing purposes, to draw crowd or bargain hunters to their store / outlet and hopefully translates into future sales (click here if you’ve never heard of Groupon before).

I managed to talk to two different business owners recently and we somehow got to the topic of Groupon and it would seem that they both have been badly ‘pinched’ by Groupon.

Initial Observation: Groupon As a Foe

1. Their business actually experienced losses. Groupon deals attracts the crowd, that’s for sure. If your products already have low margins to begin with, you may experience losses – especially when the crowd pours in for your awesome deal.

2. Their business cannot cope with the crowd. So you’ve got a deal up and you’re fully booked for the whole of next month – but you do not have the resources and the capacity to manage each and every customer. Mismanagement may turn away customers for good and if you’re planning to invest into more manpower and equipment, you better have the margins well calculated because…

3. Your existing customers (that may not be on Groupon) will also want discounts because of the awesome deal you’re already giving to others.

4. On top of that, the customer retention rate is said to be very low, at about 5% – 10% and in some cases it still does not make up to the ideal margin.

While the above may not be true for every business out there, many have experienced the negative affect of Groupon which led me to think – is Groupon really that bad of a business / marketing model to adopt?

My answer is: no.

7 Tips on How to Maximize Groupon for Your Business

#1: Know Your Margins

Understand this before proceeding: while every business can use Groupon, not every business should use Groupon. The reason is simple – if your business operates on very low profit margins, you’ll definitely end up with a loss – especially if you’re a small business without any marketing budget set aside. Know how much of a margin you’re able to spare (and survive), even if there’s a large crowd. Set the group discount rate at a level in which you’re comfortable at and yet remain attractive.

#2: Know Your Business Operations

This applies best to the service industries. Know when are your peak and off-peak seasons or timings in a day. ‘Sell’ your off-peaks cheaper in return for crowd. This is where Groupon can truly shine – put in terms and conditions specifying that the offer / deal will only work during specific timing of a day (e.g. 3-5pm) to boost sales rather than not making any sale during the off-peak hours.

#3: Never Give in Quality for Quantity

Use the crowd to your advantage – show them what you’re able to offer even when you’re under pressure. Whether it is customer service or food preparation, make sure you’re showing your customers the best you can offer. This is the time to give them a reason to come back for more!

#4: Build Your Database – Engage

Take this opportunity to build your database by engaging with your customers individually. Talk to them, get them to subscribe to your newsletter, ‘like’ you Facebook page, ‘follow’ your Twitter handle, sign-up for a loyalty programme, participate in a contest or even to write a testimonial for you. In other words, do not let them leave without leaving you with something valuable for your business. On top of that…

#5: Follow-up Offers

Don’t let them leave empty handed! Give them something in return to invite them to come back for more. Something along the lines of “bring a friend on your next visit to enjoy a similar treat” can do wonders. Retention rates are low because businesses do not give the customers sufficient reasons to stay. So why let them leave empty handed?

#6: Make The News

Make use of the crowd to spread the news! Snap pictures, tweet away, launch a Foursquare special and create buzz across existing social media platforms. Customers are drawn to crowd and if you are already attracting one, let them know you have one!

#7: Encourage Feedback

This is the most important of all – always ask for feedback from your customers so that you’ll know what went wrong / right to do better in your next Groupon deal. Offer as many feedback options as possible – through Twitter, Facebook, contact forms or emails and be sure to respond to everyone of them positively.

Have you used Groupon for your business? How did it work out for you? How else do you think Groupon can benefit businesses?

Are You Building Engagement Points for Your #SocialMedia Campaigns?

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The objective of this article is not to remind you how powerful and important social media is to your business today but to tell you that being on social media is not the solution to stay competitive in the market.

We all know that social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are great tools to maximize online visibility. The question is, how can your business capitalize on the growing evolution of social media and not fizzle out?

If you already have a social presence, great! This may help you enlarge your ‘territory’. If you’ve yet to integrate social media into your business, consider this as a point for having one:

Creating Social Engagement Points for Your Business

Yes, you may have a blog or a Facebook page but do you know how many engagement points are you using? In other words, how are you allowing your customers to engage with you? Identifying your engagement points can maximize your effectiveness on that platform simply because you’re allowing your audience to engage with you differently.

Take a look at the video below:

Now this video has nothing to do with blogs, Facebook or Twitter but it holds one powerful concept to being successful on social media: enlarging engagement points so that their customers can engage with them (through purchasing) even outside of their stores.

Tesco realized 2 important points:

1a. To increase engagement points does not mean they have to be opening new outlets everywhere. In social media, that also translates to you do NOT need to be on every social media platform just to be seen engaging with your customers.

1b. To effectively engage with your customers, you need to be where they are at and in this case, it was the subway. Where are your customers congregating? Are they even on Facebook to begin with? Or would they be hanging out in technology forums? DeviantArt, perhaps? Know where they are and be there!

2. The power of having 1 platform but multiple engagement points. Tesco used the subways as the platform along with QR codes – not one, but one for every product. Think about it – Tesco could have done only ONE QR code and redirect the customer to their online shopping site for the purchase to take place but they chose to have them individually. This boosts interactivity and allows customers to actively engage in a different way.

How are you allowing your customers to engage with you on social media? Only on your Facebook wall? Your comments section? How many engagement points do you have?

17 Simple Engagement Points for Your Blog and Facebook Page

Facebook

#1: Wall (yours)
#2: Wall (your customers’)
#3: Questions / Polls
#4: Contests
#5: Welcome Page
#6: Subscription Tab
#7: ‘Like’ / ‘Share’ Button
#8: Profile Picture (e.g. fan of the week)
#9: Photo Tagging
#10: Events

Blog

#11: Comments
#12: Social Sharing (Retweet, Share, Digg, Stumble, +1, etc)
#13: RSS Subscription
#14: Email Subscription
#15: Contact Page
#16: Links to your Social Profiles (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube etc)
#17: Guest Posting

What are your thoughts on having multiple engagement points? What other engagement points you think businesses and individuals should also implement?

Brand Focus #3: The One Thing That Should NOT Happen on #SocialMedia for Your Business

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We all know how social media spreads both the good and bad and your business should be careful on what and how you’re responding to your customers. A couple of weeks ago I shared on how just one dissatisfied customer can lead to 10,000 dissatisfactions and you will most definitely want to pay attention to the below screenshot of a conversation on Facebook below:

social media mishaps in malaysiaAre You Listening Attentively?

Clearly the company above isn’t. Sure they are responding quickly to the complain but addressing the customer wrongly takes away the merit – especially calling him / her “shameful”. Good thing the company spotted the error and apologized not too long after but that has remained as a joke in Malaysia for days.

What Can You Learn Out Of This?

#1: Double and triple check before posting. I know most companies have a standard template reply and have grown to use them a bit too much resulting in simple errors such as inconsistency in addressing the customer’s name or in situations such as the above.

#2: Train your staff / social media manager. This may sound like common sense but from what happened above, there IS a possibility that the person you’ve put in-charge may not know their way around the tool (in this case, Facebook) well.

#3: Know your language. I’ve to admit that not everyone may be excellent in English, especially when it comes to writing but know this – if your audience is proficient in English, make sure your employees are proficient in English;likewise for any other languages be it Chinese, French, Spanish or Arabic.

#4: Don’t respond for the sake of responding. Are you sure that post / comment / feedback meant what you think it is saying? Are you making assumptions? Responding on social media platforms have a major advantage – time. Unlike over the phone where conversations become awkward if you take too long to reply, you can afford to take some time to read, re-read AND re-read to make sure you’re getting it right before responding.

#5: Admit your mistake and make up for it. Although it has already become a joke, it is important for you to own up to your mistakes and not to sweep them under the mat. NEVER delete them to cover your tracks. Accept it, respond to it positively and do not let the jokes bother you too much. Lesson learnt!

What is the one thing you think should not happen in businesses on social media? Do share them below :)

How Much Should You Spend on Setting Up Your #SocialMedia Presence?

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This topic have been really hot lately in Malaysia due to a recent “finding” where Tourism Malaysia stated that they’ve spent RM1.8M (about USD600k) to create 6 tourism Facebook pages to promote the tourism industry in Malaysia. This caused quite a stir among the public, leading to tons of complains and debates both online and offline. If you’re interested, click here to know the full story and here are the clarifications made by Tourism Malaysia.

As I followed the news closely, it is interesting to see remarks made by various individuals and some of them can relate to how businesses react to social media integration today when it comes to $.

free parking on social media?“Social media is FREE. Why do I need to pay?”

Sounds familiar?

While most social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter are free where you can simply ‘park’ your brand / business on a page, there are several areas that don’t come cheap – especially if you’re thinking of an elaborated campaign or planning to hire someone to do the job for you. Having that said, randomly putting aside a figure won’t do you good. At the very least, consider the following areas:

How Should You Plan Your Social Media Budget?

1. Consider Your Expertise

– Do you have the knowledge and / or the skills to manage social media tools?
– Will you be doing the job or are you hiring?
– Do you have a team to determine the social media strategy?
– Do you even have a social media strategy? (hint: creating a Facebook page to get as many likes as possible is NOT a strategy)
– Do you need a consultant to help you with your social media strategy?
– Do you have the technical skills to execute those strategies (if required. e.g. Facebook apps)

2. Consider the Promotion Itself

– How will you go about promoting your social media presence (blogger write-ups, reviews, online advertising, email marketing, etc)?
– How big of a team is required to carry out the promotion?

3. Consider Long-Term

– Who will be managing (i.e. creating content, engaging, monitoring, etc) the social media accounts?
– Will it managed in-house or outsourced?
– Do you need a consultant to keep you on track?

Considering all of the above, you should be able to tell by now that social media CAN cost quite a bit or it could cost you nothing but time and effort if you’re doing all of it alone. It is interesting to note that even though many feel uncomfortable spending on social media, a recent study indicated that businesses plans to spend more on social media in 2011 as compared to 2010.

Need an idea on how much to spend? Click here to take a look at this survey done in the US.

On top of that, companies (especially experienced ones) are also seen outsourcing the design and development, content creation and analytics to social media agencies instead [source].

Social Media Spending Trending Up

How much do you think businesses should spend on social media? What are the areas they should consider the most?

 

The #SocialMedia Dot-Com Mentality

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The dot-com era was the beginning of really exciting times. It was revolutionary. It was the beginning of people willing to spend money for something that is intangible like a .com domain name. We can definitely learn a lot from those days. A couple of weeks I go I wrote about 5 lessons we can learn from the dot-com boom and bust and that’s not all!

Mentality #1: Let’s play monopoly

social media monopoly - a dot-com mentality on social media

It is interesting that many businesses create a blog, a Facebook page and a Twitter account just because it is “the right thing to do”, to keep up with technology just like how .com domain names were sold like hotcakes during the dot-com boom. Businesses are busy securing .com sites social media accounts even though they have no plans of using them.

While that may seem like a normal thing to do, social media is a different playing field altogether especially if you’re registering the accounts under a similar name such as your brand or company name. A simple query on Google will be able to reveal all of them… buried with dust, which ultimately affects your credibility.

Mentality #2: If it’s online, it’s global

During the dot-com boom, many had the impression that as long they have a website, they can easily be found. True, but also VERY wrong. It is true that if you’ve a website or a social media account your business is accessible globally. However the question is – whether you can be found among the mass of information and websites out there. Even if Facebook has 600 million users, it does not guarantee you 600 million impressions if you have a Facebook page. In fact, it takes hard work to even get your first 1,000 followers if you’re a small business.

Remember, social media is merely a tool – you’ll still need to get down and get it to work for you and people today often rely on search engines and personal recommendations (e.g. Facebook likes, Tweets, blogs and comments) to locate what they need online.

Mentality #3: Information (Part 1) – That’s all I need on my website

Yes, information is important and it still is today. Imagine yourself going onto a website only to find nothing about that particular business. It sure defeats the purpose of having a website. The thing is, businesses should also understand that people today demand more than just information.

Let me ask you this question: would you rather buy from someone that has only pure information or someone with an updated blog and perhaps an active Facebook page?

What makes things worse are sites that have dates beneath their home page that dates back to the past. Does that imply that you’re out of business in the present day?

Mentality #4: Information (Part 2) – The more the merrier

Remember how websites looked back then? Presenting to you the all-powerful frames:

website with frames

It was really something. Businesses were able to display even more information within a single screen. But is that the case today? Clearly not. In fact, search engines are not very happy with frames. Sites today display a minimalistic outlook to simplify the message – doing away with jargons and boring texts. Is your website overloaded with information? Less is more!

Mentality #5: The almighty enquiry form

The enquiry form is perhaps one of the most important addition to almost every business websites out there. After all, it is one of the easiest way for customers to keep in touch with you. Don’t get me wrong – it still is a powerful tool today. The question is – is it enough?

I don’t know about you but I personally do not like enquiry forms especially if I only have a short / simple question to ask. I’d rather leave a comment, a post on their Facebook wall or a Tweet. Imagine filling in all the fields on the enquiry form just to ask “are you open this weekend?”. Plus, there somehow is a feeling of a ‘black hole’ when submitting an enquiry form – you do not know whether it is actually sent. On social media platforms, you know they’ve received it for sure.

Do you fall into any one of the mentalities above? What other dot-com mentalities have you noticed today? I’d love to hear them :)

 

Brand Focus #2: Basic Customer Service Mistakes You Don’t Want to Bring onto #SocialMedia

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I was hungry one afternoon and I did not want to leave the house as it has been really hot where I’m at lately. I thought that since I’ve not had pizza for quite some time, I could just order one and have it delivered within 30 minutes – after all, that’s their service promise. To top if off, they now have a tracking service so I’ll know where my pizza is at. Cool!

Dominos Pizza Malaysia

So I placed my order at 2.32pm, expecting it to arrive at 3.02pm and you’ve guessed it – it did not arrive then. “No problems”, I thought. “I’ll just get a free pizza on my next order and delays do happen anyway.”

3.15pm and the pizza has yet to arrive and this is where I decided to put Dominos Malaysia’s customer service to test. I called up the call centre and reported my “missing” pizza in which they told me that perhaps the rider was lost and advised me to give him another 5 minutes else I should call them back.

10 minutes passed, 3.30pm and still no sign of the pizza. I called Dominos as they told me to and they told me to wait for another 5 to 10 minutes and that there is nothing that he (the sales rep) can do to help. Shocked by his reply, I probed further and he then said his manager may be able to do something about it but he isn’t free at the moment and mentioned that the manager will call me back the moment he is free.

The verdict? 3 days have passed, no calls received.

This incident reminds me of my past experience with another company.

3 Basic Customer Service Mistakes That Should NOT Be Brought To Social Media

Lesson #1: Don’t Assume If You Aren’t Sure

5 minutes. Are you sure? If there’s one thing in common in most customer service personnel, they give inaccurate information or in other words, false hope. They give a solution that is of most convenient to them and hope that it’ll never come back to them.

On social media platforms, it is worse. When a customer posts a question or complain on your blog / Facebook page / timeline, they are most likely already confused or dissatisfied with you and should be handled with care. If you do not know the answer, seek for help or offer to discuss the solution privately via email (and get someone to help you out!). Do not ever give answers for the sake of giving them.

Lesson #2: Be Careful of What You Speak

customer service on social media - think before you speakLike it or not, you’re representing your brand and saying “I can’t do anything to help” can be detrimental, even though it was not meant in that way. This may be more difficult to do over the phone but you’ve got no excuse if it is on the computer screen.

Take some time to structure your words before clicking on the “submit”, “update” or “tweet” button.

Lesson #3: Do What You’ve Said You’ll Do… and Don’t Take Too Long

The last thing customer wants is to wait. Get back to them within the shortest time frame possible! If you’ve said you would call, email or reply to their enquiry, do so! I personally think that no business should take more than 24 hours to respond. Anything more will clearly spell out to the customer that you’re N.O.T.I.N.T.E.R.E.S.T.E.D.

It won’t look good if the same customer posts on your wall for the 2nd time demanding for a reply. Remember, everyone is watching!

Is there any other mistakes you think should be avoided at all cost on social media? Share them below!

 

By the way, the pizza came at about 3.40pm and I received a standard voucher for a free pizza on my next order but still no phone call from them.

The 5 Groups of Marketers on #SocialMedia

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Having worked and talked with a number of businesses in Malaysia, I find that there are 5 groups of people out there when it comes to taking on social media. Whether they are small business owners, marketing personnel from large corporations or even individuals, they all seem to fall into one of the groups below:

Group 1: The Fans

You know social media is the way forward. You embrace it no matter where they are or the situation that they’re in. You know your way in and out of social media tools such as Facebook and Twitter. You are very active and you’re everywhere – perhaps the first to jump on that new social network recently launched – there is just no social media tool you will miss, as long there is “social media” labeled on it.

Group 2: The Skeptics

You feel that social media is a trend and it will soon fade away simply because conventional media still reigns. Perhaps you’ve tried this social media thingy and found that it does not work for you and does not see how it can for others, too. You may see it as a gimmick that marketing agencies are trying to sell and you just don’t see why would anyone want to follow your business on Twitter or check-in to your business on Foursquare. Social media is overrated.

Group 3: The Navigators

These are the people that know their way around social media. You know what are the best tools around, what works and what does not, what tools to use for a particular situation. You see the potential of social media and know how it can both benefit and fail your business depending how it is managed. You’ve all the knowledge and is constantly learning and you’re good in putting together strategies and plans to make it work for you.

Group 4: The Lurkers

Or perhaps also known as readers. You go around reading blog posts, tweets from specific #hashtags, following those at the top in the industry, always accumulating knowledge on your own. Yes, you may have your own social media accounts but they are just avenues for you to obtain information or maybe even to keep tabs on your competitors. You may also be feeling inadequate because others seem to be more knowledgeable / experienced than you.

Group 5: The Creators

Just the opposite of Lurkers – you create content and participate across social media platforms. You’ve that burning desire within you to keep sharing what you have, not afraid of what another may think of you. Chances are you already have a blog and is on Twitter or Facebook (at least) to get your words and thoughts out. You’re participating in chats, communities, groups and comments. You’re doing it as a way to express your thoughts and ideas.

Which Group Do You Fall Under?

So, how do you see yourself on social media? I say I’m a little bit of a creator + navigator (and fan :p) when it comes to social media, simply because I get excited when talking to people about it and even more so when the question pops “how can my business use social media?”.

Before Doing Anything, Know Yourself

Many times individuals and businesses fail on social media because they THOUGHT they should be what they aren’t. Unless you’re a master of disguise, the consumers can see through you right away. Understand that there is no right or wrong group to fall under.

However, if you’re only obsessed about content creation, don’t neglect lurking once in awhile. If you’re all about lurking, maybe you should put your knowledge together and be a navigator instead. Too much of a group can also be your downfall.

What about you? What group do you fall under?