Building Customer Loyalty Using Social Media

Social Media Customer Loyalty

Welcome to the sixth step in our series of ‘8 steps to B2B Social Media Success’

In this step we will delve into the topic of building customer loyalty using your social media presence.

What is loyalty?

Well, loyalty comes in a number of forms such as loyalty to things, people or groups of people. You could have a strong allegiance to a football team, admire a pop star (just look at all the ‘Beliebers’!), be devoted to a brand of jeans or be fanatical about the latest high tech products, for example, Apple.

Loyalty on Social Media

If a customer is loyal to a particular product or brand and they use social media regularly, they will likely be following the company or have liked their fan page - all with the intention of finding out more or engaging.

Some of the main reasons people like brands on social media include:

• To support their preferred brand
• To get some form of discount on the products or services they sell
• A voucher for something beneficial (not necessarily price-related)
• To enter competitions in the hope of winning something
• To share and hear about personal experiences

By playing to these desires you can really start to nurture and build loyalty towards your product or brand.

What about B2B loyalty on Social Media?

Looking at loyalty from a business to business perspective is a similar story. If you are responsible for your B2B social media channel you must have the best interests of your business and customers at the core of all decisions. Personal preferences should not feature in your decision making process for your business, especially on social media, as all of your decisions and interactions will have an effect on the reputation of your business. Do it badly and you could have a significant problem on your hands!

As part of our awareness blog, we highlighted the importance of being aware of your audience and collaborating with influential businesses within your industry, this is all part of building your brand loyalty with your customers and clients. Your customers will appreciate seeing your empathetic side and relish the fact that you are keen to interact with different businesses.

How do you build B2B customer loyalty on Social Media?

There are numerous approaches to building customer loyalty through social media. We have highlighted a few below but would be delighted to hear any examples you may have had building customer loyalty through social media.

Be human - giving a human face to your profile isn’t difficult and allows you the opportunity to show off your personality and lets your audience see you are an empathetic and approachable business. Simple ways to humanise your profile include reciprocating likes and engagement with your audience. By liking your contacts and making regular comments you can demonstrate you are interested in and committed to a long term relationship.

Incentivise - yes, it seems quite contrived but a lot of people are keen to sign up to your social media page in the hope of winning a competition, or the like, which will usually require your business offering something of value (real or perceived). This strategy isn’t as cost prohibitive as it may seem because it can help generate a buzz amongst your all of your followers (not just the winners!) and encourage more people to join in and like/ interact with your page - you have to be in it to win it! - and the larger your audience, the greater the chances of ultimately converting them into customers. Incentivising your social experience can be an invaluable aspect of building your brand loyalty through social media.

Giveaways - don’t worry, you don’t always have to spend money and give away gifts in return for loyalty - likewise if you are providing your audience with various items, such as a 'How to Guide', you still don't have to give away your company’s crown jewels. The purpose of giveaways on social media is to allow your audience to see more about the type of services you can offer and to give them a teaser. By doing this you will hopefully build your credibility and encourage them to contact you again for more information about your products or service. Giveaways help to build affinity with your customers and when they have the need for your service they will hopefully give you a call or at least refer you to a friend or business contact.

Customer Service - we have avoided the obvious comment about having a great product or service to build loyalty and for the purposes of this blog we have assumed you actually know what you are talking about and your product actually works! However, where you can make a difference is your customer service and how you deal with your customer queries/ issues via social media.

Do you have a separate customer service social media channel in place or are you a global multinational that operates your social media on a 9-5 basis? (British Airways take note!) Giving great customer service online and via social media can be a real win-win for your business. You can save on operational costs, whilst at the same time communicate with your customers via a medium that suits them - in real time!  Stay tuned for our future blogs on social media customer service.

Responsiveness - Lastly, we would advocate the need to be responsive to customers on social media. On one level you should respond and engage daily with regular run of the mill engagements on social media but on the other hand, if you offer customer service over social media there is no point in just sticking your head in the sand and ignoring the bad messages that come through - whether they are true or not! The trick with negative comments is rather than ignore them - try to steer them offline in order to get to the bottom of the issue and find a way to resolve it in private. If appropriate you could ask them to comment on how the day was saved in the end - although don't push it nor should you do it without their permission...

To summarise...

Building loyalty with your customers means being transparent and genuine, especially on social media where people are more likely to make their feelings heard! One negative comment, a poorly written post or an unsatisfactory response to a complaint can have disastrous consequences on the reputation of your company and can run the risk of going viral if not managed properly.

Demonstrating and building loyalty with your customers via social media isn’t a difficult task, it’s simple to reciprocate, engage and converse with your audience on social media - the hard bit is doing it right! Your social media presence allows your audience to see the personality behind the corporate profile and at the end of the day, customer loyalty is defined by what people do and say about you to other people. You need to make sure you have worked out your approach and do it right from the beginning.

We hope you found this blog enlightening and it has helped to stimulate a few ideas to help your approach to building customer loyalty through social media. Your company would be nothing without your customers so why not take some time out and think about how you can engage with them better and build a better overall relationship with them?

We would love to hear some stories that have inspired loyalty with your customers. Feel free to post below, give us a call or drop in for a coffee.

Till next time... when we will be looking at the whole area of social media collaboration.