what does it mean to be social for businesses?
I was speaking with an acquaintance yesterday about social media and Return on Investment, and I made the point that one of the biggest issues businesses have is learning the social skills to make social media work for them enough to actually generate a return on investment. Typically, what I see with a business is a tendency to advertise what they do, with little to no engagement offered in their social media interactions. there’s very little incentive, consequently, for fans, followers, or friends to actually visit the businesses website, or physical location, and a lot more incentive to actually ignore or write off the business’s social interactions as advertisement.
Once a business learns to view social media through a social lens, their activity changes. Suddenly they become much more personable and open about what they are doing that isn’t business related. They comment on news that isn’t relevant to the business, but does illustrate personality. And the result is that people who are fans, followers, or friends start to interact more, show interest in the business and sometimes become converted to clients, or if they are existing clients, show more inclination to come back for further services. And the reason for this is simple. People wanted to be treated as people first and clients second.
Think of the last time you visited a business that you like frequenting. What about the business is it that makes you want to come back for more? I’ll use an example. I love visiting my local gamestop. The clerks know who I am, love talking games, but can talk about other things, and generally go out of their way to make me feel welcomed. Now take that feeling and apply it in a social media setting.
One of my clients is Saint Honore’s Bakery. If you go to their facebook page, something you’ll notice is that they make an effort to reply to comments customers make to the wall or to comments customers make to the status updates the bakery makes. Most importantly the bakery is focused on being social first and business second. They still post information about what they’re offering that day, but they also make it a point to engage people and interact with them. The result is more fan participation and more in store business, because people feel that the experience that they get online will translate into the store environment.
What it means to be social for business involves understanding that social media is a social environment, and that strategy for social media needs to keep that consideration in mind in order to be truly effective. Remember, people want to be treated like people first, and customers second.
What do you think? Do you agree or disagree about the value of being social for businesses?
Categories: Social Media, social media behavior
Tags: social influence, Social Media, social media behavior, social media relationships, Taylor Ellwood
