Social Customer Relationship Management (CRM) helps to combine all information pulled from social media. Using CRM analytics, a company can determine how to best use this information by tracking, measuring and analyzing audience behaviour. Adams (2018) explains that social CRM flips the script by building systems for customers to interact with and choose the way they interact with the organization, which ultimately gives the customer more flexibility. There are many benefits of CRM such as:
- More meaningful engagement
- Creation of brand advocates
- Collection of useful data
- Construction of brand image
Companies can add social CRM to their strategy from 4 main approaches:
- Sales – understand where prospects are online and what they’re discussing
- Customer Service and Support – real time, multi channel support
- Customer Experience – understand customers needs and wants and create unique experience for them
Adams (2028) explains that “a social CRM platform gives your organization all the tools it needs to grow, all in one central location.” Using a social CRM platform impacts sales by automating and boosting sales, marketing by engaging with customers and prospects, and customer service by delivering outstanding and responsive customer support. When deciding on a platform, many things need to be considered and evaluated. Support for social media platforms, brand monitoring, social CRM analytics and integration with other platforms are all key components that should be included in the platform you choose. Most platforms will offer trials as a way for businesses to test drive their platform, which Adams (2018) advises businesses to take advantage of since you don’t want to be stuck in a bad option which halts company growth.
Social CRM success depends on organization support and the allocation of resources. There are various areas in a business that need attending. These areas include:
- Leadership Support – includes top level support. Key components include identifying decision makers/influencers and creating your business case.
- Organization Strategy and Culture – ensure alignment with organization strategy and goals.
- Budget – need to invest in growth.
- Building a Social CRM Team – staff team with early adopters, determine roles and invest in a social team.
- Training – look to social CRM provider for training opportunities while supporting the social CRM team.
- Monitoring – evaluate performance. Monitor all social CRM activity and give additional support when required.
Develop Your Strategy
Adams (2018) explains that social CRM can be used to create a more personalized experience for customers. Using an effective CRM strategy increases organization’s brand while creating fans. A brand is the overall impression a consumer gets from the communication and marketing methods a company uses. These organizations want to ensure brand consistency in the mind of the consumer and achieve this through offering advanced humanization and personalization. Humanization focuses on the connection of personality and people connecting with people. Personalization focuses on customers having the ability to choose and share their own experiences with a brand, basically allowing them to choose how they experience the brand.
Social media optimization is crucial towards many companies social CRM strategies. Offering customer service through social media is an easy way to support your customers while tracking brand consistency. Adams (2018) lists the rules of engagement that organizations should clearly define in order to set the standard for every customer interaction. This includes:
- Tone and voice
- Setting responses to specific situations
- Personalized responses
- Guideline for communications
Businesses need to communicate with customers how they can be reached. This could include a brief description in a social media bio including customer support numbers and email. This introduces the idea of creating a social media account based on your business. Creating dedicated support accounts help centralize social CRM activity. Being proactive in responses on these support accounts is essential, so make sure you communicate issues that will affect the customer base (outage), give consistent updates until the issue is resolved and make sure to demonstrate you are on top of the issue. Adams (2018) recommends the use of a social media monitor tool to help quantify your brands sentiment and avoid a negative reputation.
Adams (2018) states that the use of social CRM says goodbye to one size fits all marketing. This allows companies to use a focussed targeting approach that involves highly individualized messages that strongly appeal to the customer. These businesses use segmentation to divide customers into groups using factors such as behaviours. This allows the business to personalize their content by individualizing and tailoring directly to the customer. Adams (2018) suggests to closely monitor the effectiveness of these personalised messages and to tweak them when necessary in order to find what works best.
Manage Social CRM
Identifying influencers is an important act in the management of social CRM. Influencers have power in affecting others and drives action, not just awareness. When identifying potential influencers to build a relationship with, look at their audience/advocacy, relevance, reach and engagement. You need to make sure they are a right fit for your organization. If you have trouble finding influencers there are various tools to use to aid in your search. There are social media monitoring sites such as Klout.com and hootsuite.com. When you finally find influencers that fit in your social CRM strategy, it is time to start working with them. Adams (2018) encourages content creation through photos or videos of the influencer using the product/service. She also advises to provide giveaways and discounts, which will make consumers more interested. A strong partnership with your influencers is important so make sure to take care of them!
Engaging with prospects is a bit different when compared to an influencer. To engage successfully with prospects, Adams (2018) suggests painting a complete picture of the prospect and figure out exactly who they are. This painting should include where they are in the sales cycle, previous interactions with the organization and other valuable data. Lastly, it is time to connect with the prospect. This can be done through social media but make sure not to be too pushy and DO NOT provide a sales pitch. Allow them to investigate on their own time and provide exceptional value. This builds credibility and trust within the prospect.
Adams (2018) states that integrating customer service with social CRM is the ultimate way to support the social customer. This way you can monitor what is being said about the brand, identify the problems, contact consumers instantly and acknowledge loyal customers. Negative feedback is a given, but it is all about how you handle it! Adams (2018) states that every customer issue that arises in the social space is a marketing and public relations opportunity. She offers a brief, step by step plan on handling negative feedback. Here it is:
- Monitor internet for activity
- Bring posting into customer support que
- Facilitate employee collaboration
- Kickoff resolution with customer
Your Toolkit
Taking time to involve process documentation in your social CRM strategy relates to long term success. What exactly is process documentation? Adams (2018) defines it as documents that support a process, the activity of process discovery, process mapping software and procedure templates. Businesses should start this process by creating a roadmap. This roadmap should create a new standard for optimising customer relations, build connections with customers and leverage new channels to create more personal communication. Adams (2018) lists 7 main factors in business process success criteria. This includes:
- Ownership
- Goals
- Metrics
- Interfaces
- Documentation
- Integrity
- Alignment with business vision
In order to execute process documentation properly, understanding your organization’s needs is critical. With this information, you can choose the right tools. Choosing tools that support where work is being done is key. You can use wiki, a shared google documents, an internal portal or even a social CRM platform.
My Conclsuion
Megan Adam’s (2018) video taught me about developing a social CRM strategy and how to manage it by using certain tools. If I was starting a business, I would add a social CRM strategy to my marketing by social listening to learn about online audience behaviour. Using this information, I would be able to know certain behaviours of potential consumers and what exactly they are interested in, and market my product/service based on those needs. Since public relations and customer feedback is so important, I would set up a twitter account to handle customer service. In order to utilize my social media account to the fullest, I would use Klout.com to help monitor my account. In the case of handling negative feedback, I would use Adams 4 step procedure which I defined earlier in the summary. Like Adam’s (2018) stated in her video, we all want to be seen and heard, why would your customers be any different?
References
Adams, M. (2018, April 11). Social Media Marketing: Social CRM – Welcome. Retrieved March 9, 2020, from LinkedIn website: https://www.linkedin.com/learning/social-media-marketing-social-crm/welcome?u=2109516
CRM With Social Media Integration. (2019). Retrieved from http://www.crmscore.com/crm-strategy/crm-social-media-integration/
Wignall, C. (2019). Strategy Lies. Retrieved from https://catalystfoundation.ca/strategy-lies/
Your Toolkit. (2018). Retrieved from https://www.yourtoolkit.com.au/
Zach Black Social Media Blog 