I had a very frustrating experience yesterday – I had a moment of laziness and thought about asking a local bakery to make my son’s birthday cake. I know they make gorgeous cakes because I see pictures of them every week on a Facebook Group I belong to. I have even liked their Page as I think their cakes are so pretty. “No problem,” I thought, “I will just pop them a message on Facebook to ask about pricing.” I did just that.
This is the response I received later in the day. “Please do mail the ladies at [email protected] as we are an external marketing company I am sure they will assist . We trust you understand and have a good day“.
WHAT?
If You Gonna Dip A Toe, Be Prepared To Get Wet.
Here is a Golden Rule of social media marketing: if you are going to market to people on social media, then you need to be ready to respond to people on social media! You cannot have the attitude that you will use the platform to get exposure, but then not engage with people when they respond? Are you nuts? And what kind of advise is this “external marketing” company giving their clients if they think this a positive way to build up client relationships?
Fast Response = Conversion
Any marketer knows that the faster you respond to a query, the better your chances are of converting that lead into a sale. What is not often mentioned and explored is the necessity to respond in the same way that people enquired. Why do you think so many web forms ask for the best way to contact you? The reason is that people have different comfort levels with certain types of communication. Now take me – I am a web form type of girl. I don’t want to phone or email someone, I want to fill in a form and have someone get back to me. My husband on the other hand likes to talk to a real live human being. He wants a phone number, or a live chat option. So if you only have your phone number on your website, you will lose my enquiry. I would rather find another site where I don’t have to actually talk to someone. Terrible, isn’t it?
The second part of this is that you should never make a potential customer or client work to get hold of you. Why must I now take the time our to email these people? They have an active Facebook presence, so I used that to communicate. If they were actively on Twitter, I may have DM’ed them. I do not expect to then be told I must now take further action to actually get hold of them. Sorry, I don’t want the cake that badly.
Social Media Is About Connections, Not Views
What this company has completely missed is the real beauty behind social media marketing – it isn’t about how many people you can get to see your products/services. It is about the fact that you can create instant, one on one communication with them, and grow your online community. That is what makes social media such a powerful converter, as it creates raving rabid fans based on personal interactions with a company. This interaction that I have had was not personal, and I am very unlikely to remain a fan.
At Waverly Digital Solutions we do social media marketing and social media training for select clients and the key is that we always respond to queries – we get the answers from the people that know and respond. We value each and every connection made for what it is – the birth of a potential brand ambassador.
