Social Media Marketing Goes Far Beyond the Marketing Department

How much do you care about comments, “likes”, “shares”, “retweets” and “mentions”? How much do you think companies should care about these vanity metrics? Well, the answer depends on what objectives they pursue. By now you should remember that according to the POST model, technologies or tools come last whereas the priority is given to the clear objectives that should be set by companies in advance (Li, Bernoff, p.67). Consequently, if the ultimate goal is to raise brand awareness before launching a product, then the overall number of mentions is a metric that should be considered in the first place. On the other hand, if it is an improved customer experience that a company is striving to achieve, then the focus should be shifted to a two-way online conversation, and here comments and replies should be carefully monitored and responded. While answering to positive reviews does fall within a social media marketer’s competence, complaints are harder to address without being an expert in a certain area.

The survey provides us with the reasons why customers reach out companies on social media. We see that most respondents will go online if they have been scammed or received bad customer service. What can aggravate a situation or, vice versa, win those disappointed customers back? The statistics make it clear for us. Stonewalling will worsen things while responsiveness in addressing customer needs will mend previous poor service, lead to customer retention and, consequently, to the growth of revenue.

The question is how to optimize social customer service. Obviously, SMM managers are not always right people to deal with consumer’s complaints. Thus, it is time for customer support agents to become brand ambassadors and do marketing job as well. What companies can do is to streamline internal communication between various departments and blur the lines between service and marketing.

An excellent case study in this respect is Hertz, an American car rental company, which created a cross-functional social media team with responsibilities being delegated across all the departments. Since then marketing managers no longer have had to rely on customer service agents to troubleshoot a client’s problem which decreased response time and delay between customer’s request and the company’s reply. While the digital marketing department is still in charge of social media activity, the frontline falls to the newly built social customer service team of 30 agents and growing.

As a result, Hertz manages to respond to complaints at the same day they are posted.

However, if you look through the responses, you will notice that they lack transparency. The company adopted Facebook Messenger to address customer’s problems privately, and according to its policy, there is a strong likelihood that it happens in a timely manner. However, all that other clients see is dissatisfaction and no evidence of positive outcomes. Most likely it will discourage them from making a deal with Hertz and renting a car. Therefore, incorporating employees from other departments and solving problems one-to-one is insufficient for better customer service. There should be evidence for other clients that calling out brands on social media is worth it. Only then companies would be able to restore their tarnished reputations and retain customers.

In the end, I would like to leave you with the quote by David Packard, the co-founder of Hewlett-Packard (hp): “Marketing is too important to be left to the marketing people”.

Have you ever thought about marketing from this perspective? Share your ideas in the comments below!