Written by ContentPowered.com
Twitter is one of the largest social media networks on the web. The platform was originally designed to help people quickly exchange small amounts of information at a time. For friends, this meant having a conversation that anyone in the world could chime in to. In just a few short years, Twitter became a place for companies to connect directly with their customers, interacting with them on a more personal level. The unique set up has evolved into an excellent promotional tool for companies, rather than a simple place for friends to relax.
Maintaining Twitter
Unlike other social media networks, maintaining a Twitter account can be very demanding. Most networks “don’t sleep” but user activity tends to go down during certain hours of the night. With Twitter, people are logged on constantly and will actively tweet throughout the night. This means being there to greet them with new messages and respond to them at all hours.
Companies that respond quickly to negative messages tend to have more loyal customers than those who don’t. Using Twitter allows you to do this very quickly, which reduces the chances that other potential customers will see the complaint or view it negatively. In order to do this properly, companies need to be logged on regularly and responding to every message received.
For large companies, investing in a social media account manager is often recommended. While you can automate tweets in response to negative remarks and even schedule regular, positive messages about your company, you should have a real person responding to users. A real person can offer technical support, product advice, or a more sincere apology than a machine can.
Large companies also have a problem with receiving more tweets than a single person can handle. For example, if your company is getting hundreds of tweets every hour, you are going to need a system in place to make sure every customer is heard. Because people can all log on to the same account at once, most companies hire multiple account managers who sign every response they send with their initials.
Twitter is Cost-Effective
Depending on your volume, Twitter can be a great way to keep advertising dollars at a minimum. There are many companies that hire representatives to work out of their homes, which allows the company to avoid the same costs as a call center or customer service department.
Another benefit is that representatives can deal with multiple issues at the same time. In a traditional customer service setting, one representative would need to occupy their time helping one customer until the problem was solved. Because each message is short, representatives using Twitter can help multiple people at the same time, reducing waiting and increasing overall productivity.
Like other forms of social media networking, some routine processes can still be automated. For example, if you have an epidemic of a specific complaint and have only one answer, you can pre-write a response and have it automatically send to people. It is often recommended that someone still check each tweet, but they could easily copy and paste a response. This speeds up the rate of service even more and helps representatives satisfy several customers at once for a lower overall cost.
Fast Customer Service
One of the biggest benefits of using Twitter to answer customer service inquiries is that it is fast. When dealing with an upset customer, you need to be able to answer them quickly. The longer the company waits, the more likely people will associate the product negatively.
Negative comments tend to pile up quickly on the Internet and at a faster rate than positive ones. When several negative comments are left ignored, than potential customers tend to see it as an ongoing issue with the company. This causes them to form negative opinions about the brand.
Showing the world that you respond quickly helps them put their mind at ease when shopping with you. It also helps your ongoing image and changes the way customers see problems others are having with your brand. They will see that the issues are not constant and when there are issues, they are delt with promptly and effectively.
Build Customer Trust
Nearly 90 percent of people who tweet about a company want to get a reply, especially if they have something negative to say. Almost everyone who gets a response from a company is satisfied and feels like their voice has been heard. Being there and actively listening to your customers is what helps to boost loyalty to your brand and establish you as a leader.
Trust isn’t just about responding and doing it quickly, it is about providing helpful information and listening to your customers. Because messages are short on Twitter, they are fast and easy to read. This makes communication clearer, and problems can be solved easier.
Promote Content Supporting Claims
Twitter also allows you to add links, images, and video to your tweets. This helps you to communicate your ideas and responses in ways that people can understand. For example, it is very difficult to offer technical advice in just a few short words. However, you could say something like “Your modem may need to be reset. Click here to see the steps.”
Referring people to your content can help you in a number of different ways. The biggest is that it re-establishes your brand as a source of information that can easily be shared with other users. The person you have just helped can share the content with their friends that may be having the same issues. You can also use this opportunity to gain some traffic to these resources, helping them to perform better in the search results.
Increase Company Sales
The most important reason people should invest their time into Twitter is that it has the power to increase overall sales. Because you are actively tweeting and promoting your brand, you are driving more traffic to your website and content.
Unlike search engine optimization, the traffic you get from Twitter is even more finely targeted. Most of the people who click on your links will have already made a connection with your company. The better that connection is, the more apt they are to make a purchase.
Your customer service team can easily use Twitter to their advantage. The more they answer questions and promote links, the more likely those messages are to show up on people’s feeds. Because anyone can jump into the conversation, people who are interested in your industry can easily contribute. This allows you to advertise not only to those you are helping directly, but their friends as well.
Make Lasting Connections
Twitter is all about making connections through small status updates. These connections are very powerful and can help any company increase their sales. Investing in Twitter is not only a cost-effective way to handle some customer service complaints, it is a great way to reach out to your customers. With a small learning curve, anyone can start incorporating Twitter into their online marketing plan. See everything this social network has to offer by maintaining your account and connecting with those who want to reach you the most.