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SOCIAL CRM AND DECISION SUPPORT
times have you sprayed yourself with (pressurized) salad dressing when opening the
little container on an airplane? Someone designed that package, someone oversaw the
fi lling of it, and someone else sold cases of it to airlines catering fi rms with at least
the opportunity to understand what was likely to happen when it was opened inside
an airplane. If you don’t listen and track, you’ll never know, and without an effective
strategy and planned response, you won’t be able to do anything about it.
These seemingly small things are actually important to identify and fi x. Each,
in its own way, contributes to a conversation, a parody, or a joke—or something far
more serious that plays out on the Social Web. Rarely do any of these help you. The
other great thing is that as you fi nd these on your own or with help from customers—
and you can announce in channels like Twitter that you have fi xed them. Not only
does it send a nice message to customers like Susan, it also says to anyone else listening
that your business or organization actually pays attention to what is happening on the
Social Web. At the least, this gives you an image bump; at most, it will help you spot
a problem early as customers realize that because you are present and listening, it is
worth their time to let you know about some particular service or product issue.
Here’s the take-away: Active listening combined with the strategic integration of
what you learn into your business processes form a solid pathway to better customer
experiences and thereby to the conversations that you really want. The program can be
lightweight—basic listening combined with a triage process that picks off the big issues
and makes sure they don’t escalate—or it can be a deeply embedded and formalized
source of continuous feedback that provides a customer-feedback “heartbeat.” Either
way, by building strategically sound active listening into your internal processes, you’ve
successfully connected your business to your customers. Further, you’ve done it in a way
that they are sure to notice and appreciate. That will not only further solidify your rela-
tionship with your customers but will also result in them spreading your good word.
Nathan Gilliatt, Workflow and Social Media
Nathan Gilliatt, Principal, Social Target, provides analysis and services supporting the implemen-
tation of active listening and supporting business strategy. You can read Nathan’s blog here:
http://net-savvy.com/executive/Customer Support and Social CRM
Salesmanship begins when the customer says “no.” Support begins when the customer
says “yes.” In a sort of basic truth about business, this view of customer support clari-
fi es one of the biggest opportunities a fi rm or organization will ever have: The oppor-
tunity to make those who were happy to buy from you even happier that they did. I
Nathan Gilliatt, Workflow and Social Media
Nathan Gilliatt, Principal, Social Target, provides analysis and services supporting the implemen-
tation of active listening and supporting business strategy. You can read Nathan’s blog here:
http://net-savvy.com/executive/