12 Ways Business Can Engage, Interact and Attract Customers Using Social Media
Aug 2, 2009 at 9:50PM
Being in business, you already know that the person who is most likely to do business with you is the one that already has. Marketing time and dollars are much less when marketing for repeat business. Social Media allows you multiple free avenues to interact with “your” customers, followers and fans. These mediums host very captive audiences….your audience! If you haven’t already figured this out, Social Media is a powerful way to engage, interact and attract the right kind of people, it's called Attraction Marketing.
I have compiled a list of ideas on different ways businesses can engage using Social Media.
Live Interaction
Give your customers a way to interact with your company in real time. People love feeling like they have access to you. Assign the duty to a trustworthy employee and have them monitor any area where customers can interact. (many SM sites allow for real time conversation, I highly believe Twitter is the best place for this)
Promotions
Long term: Post a standing offer to friends & followers that can be accessed only through Social Media channels. Discount codes, free report, free item of interest, buy one get one, newsletter, free consultations etc…
Short term: Offer a one or two day only special. This can be extremely effective for restaurants, hotels etc. On a slow day, post a short term offer to help drive traffic to you that day
Free Trial Offer
New product, why post a limited time, limited amount of free trials. i.e.: The first 500 people to click here can claim their free trial of X. (of course the link takes them to your site where they can access the info on how to get the trial) This will build you a nice list of targeted consumers.
Sneak Peek at Coming Attractions
This is a powerful way to get your customers hyped up for a new product or offer. Give them a sneak peek at what’s coming out and let them know when it will be available. Use this tool to grow huge anticipation of its launch.
Polls- Please Help Us!
Polling your customers will prove to be an ace in the hole for your business. Use this tool to find out what the customer would prefer. After all, they are who you will ultimately market to, with info collected through polls you can give them exactly what they asked for. Don’t be afraid to just say….”Help us Figure This Out”!
Discussion Boards
People love to chat with each other in Social Media. Offering a discussion board is like opening up a big huge billboard for all of your customers to see. You will learn a lot about their wants, needs and habit by studying their discussions.
Special Offer to Social Media Followers Only
By offering something to Social Media users only, you will teach your customer that your SM hub is the best place to go for the newest greatest info and offers. This will also help you to track your ROE (return on engagement) in Social Media.
Announce New Product Info
Building anticipation, announcing and launching new products in the Social Media world is very effective. Like I mentioned, many of these people are already your customers and word of mouth is by far the best way to spread news. By keeping your followers informed they will inevitably spread the word for you. Social Media helps create evangelistic customer, the best kind to have. It’s like having millions of salespeople out there working for you.
Suggestions/Feedback
Let your customers chime in. I have often wondered why every company doesn’t capitalize on this tool?!? Here’s my take on this; part of being good at what you do is becoming an expert on everything that has to do with your industry. While continually learning, growing and becoming the best that you can be, it is very easy to lose site of the big picture (or should I say simple picture)…what the customer actually wants. I know that all businesses get to a point where they so engrossed in their world that they find it difficult to see it from the customers point of view. I have noticed that when I get to that point, if I ask for suggestions from my followers, that the answer becomes very apparent and usually it is very elementary.
Video
Statistics show that compared to print advertising, video has 800% more response rate with customers. The good news that goes along with this statistic is that YouTube makes it very easy to pop a video on your site and to link to the video in Social Media. Even better news….because of YouTube, amateur video is the norm, so you don’t have to spend a ton of $ on video production. Go get yourself a Flip Camera and get going! Video is a strong way to connect with people. It makes they feel like they know you and in the know like and trust world, know has proven to be 90% of the equation as far as doing business.
Giveaways
Give something away! The word free attracts people like crazy. Use this tool to get people to join you on your Social Media pages where they become part of your captive audience.
Customer Vote
Got something new coming out? Need to know what would sell best between 2 different colors, sizes or styles? Want to know which logo you should use as your new logo? Want to know what people want next? ASK THEM!! They will tell you and then you have the best solution to the issue at hand.
Photos
Posting photos and allowing your customers to post photos is one of the smartest things you can do! People love to look at pictures….especially pictures of themselves. Currently, Facebook hosts over 3.5 billion photos…need I say more?
Of course there are things businesses need to watch out for in the Social Media world. But just like everything else, with a little monitoring, things can be kept in check very easily. If you are not currently using Social Media to market your business you are going to lose if you keep your head in the sand.
Copyright © 2009, Michelle Corteggiano & Jodi Mallow Maas. All rights reserved.
Reader Comments (15)
Great ideas provided by the writer.These useful tips will definitely help the people in the business field to learn about customers suggestions and feedback .These suggestions obtained from the customers will help them in deciding whether the product need to be upgraded or no.
This is a great article and your list of 12 different ways businesses can engage using Social Media is really useful. I agree that giving something extra to customers helps businesses in the long run. Before you start selling your product/ service, you should try and find what your customer wants. Surveys, polls and discussion boards are useful to get an idea about what your customer wants. There are many professional survey companies which offer this service.
Special offer to social media followers only is a great way to keep customers interested in new offers and deals.
One of the many positive and useful aspects of social media is their potential for business/ market development. This article clearly explains how the potential can be fully harnessed. Good job! Thanks!
Very informative article Indeed.
I thought facebook,youtube and myspace was for kids and timepass only, but now I'm going to make my profiles and blogs on it and I'm also going to try the youtube trick for my products now!
This blog was very informative. It gave different ideas for interacting and engaging with customers. Good work.
This information is really useful for improving our business and attract customers. The strength behind any business is effective advertising by the help of social media. This really yields good benefits when followed in a right way.
Thanks for this post.This is such a helpful post for the business man. Keep posting such good articles .
this was a very interesting and informative Blog, I enjoyed reading it!
This is really a very usefull article for any person who is very new to a business. It provides the marketing strategies which when used efficiently proves to be effective.
This is an interesting blog.Many people don't know that businesses can engage using social media.But this blog opens your mind.Nice one,after reading this many can know the 12 ways of business engaging with social media.
Nice post, was pretty impressed with the article.good work.
When getting into a business its a must to know about the things to market the business.
hope this will help me and others.
Good post.Thanks a lot to the poster as she has given a good idea about how Business Can Engage, Interact and Attract Customers Using Social Media.I've never seen a useful and effective post like this on the web.These will definitely work out for those who are serious Business people.
These are great ideas to promote the business using Social Media. Social media is a powerful tool for improving the business very quickly and they play important role in promoting business.
My, my, my!!! What an excellentest, fantabulous (sorry, right now I'm so mesmerized that I can't give the exact, better word to describe my reading experience) article!!!!!! If there were an Oscar for articles on business tips, this one would have got it from me (seriously, I ain't exaggerating). If I start mentioning why I liked this article so much, it will go on and on and on... So I'll try to keep it as short as possible. Here it is:
First of all, all the points given have in themselves a strategy to gain more customers one way or another. Secondly, the tips given are so simple to put to practice that almost any business, no matter what the size is, can easily implement and afford it. Social media is a great way to get a business the maximum benefits these days and this is the single most article I've ever read that explains it simply yet very efficiently and effectively.
Anyone who follows the 12 tips given here can surely lead their business to a huge success. Two thumbs up to this great article!!!
Social Media is definitely a great tool to enhance business. This intellectual post makes some very interesting points on how can it be used effectively in real life to boost one's business. Social Media provides businessman a fantastic, handy platform to interact with his/her customers, to get to know them and their demands better and thereby adding to his/her chances of getting more business. All of the 12 tips given here effectively capture the essence of how to use Social Media effectively to increase your business. Thanks a lot for sharing them with us. Hope more of such helpful stuff will be available in future too.