John P @CRJRP tweets: “Best part of staying at the #DoubleTree hotel is the fresh, still warm cookies they give you when you check in. #Classy.”Sometimes, it all comes down to the cookies.
For more than 25 years, Hilton Worldwide Inc.’s M DoubleTree by Hilton hotel brand has delighted weary guests with warm chocolate chip cookies at check-in. From the moment those first cookies came out of the oven, DoubleTree began receiving positive feedback—first in suggestion boxes on site and later, as technology emerged, through hotel review websites. Then social media happened, and travelers worldwide started posting reviews on TripAdvisor, Yelp, Booking.com, Google, Kwikchex, and countless other sites, mostly about, you guessed it, the cookies.
In an article titled “Checking In? Hidden Ways Hotels Court Guests Faster,” the Wall Street Journal reported in early 2012 that just as the hotel industry began getting its collective arms around managing post-stay reviews, travelers started commenting and reviewing hotels minutes after they stepped into a hotel’s lobby.
“A guest’s first impression is even more critical these days because of social media,” noted WSJ reporter Andrea Peterson. “In the past, guests usually waited until after they checked out before posting a review on TripAdvisor or Expedia, so hotels would have time to recover from an initial service snafu. Now, with guests tweeting and posting Facebook updates about their vacations almost in real time, a bungled first impression can be immediately broadcast to hundreds—even thousands.”
Of course, the often miserable, delayed, and expensive state of air travel almost ensured that guests walked into hotel lobbies frustrated and looking for an outlet.
“Guests show up totally stressed with their shoulders up to their ears. They’ve gone through travel hell,” says Niki Leondakis, president and chief operating officer of Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants, a chain of 54 U.S. properties. We’ve all been there. Cramped quarters, lost baggage, slow shuttles—by the time we’re finally in the hotel lobby, we’re almost preprogrammed to go in with two strikes already loaded.
So, what did DoubleTree do with its fabled cookies in order to counteract this “lobby tweeting” phenomenon? They began “choreographing” the presentation to “get as much mileage out of the cookie” as possible, says Jim Holthouser, Hilton Worldwide’s global head of full-service brands.
Now, all associates are trained to hand guests the cookies first thing. Forget checking in, forget two forms of ID, forget parking passes; the cookies are the thing. “Doing that before money changes hands has a bigger impact on guest perception,” says Holthouser. Indeed, customer satisfaction scores on the “overall arrival experience” have improved, Hilton Worldwide says.
Scores are one thing, but as we’ve learned throughout this book, chatter is quite another. Guests around the world now talk about the cookies at check-in, setting the stage for a great visit:
John P @CRJRP tweets: “Best part of staying at the #DoubleTree hotel is the fresh, still warm cookies they give you when you check in. #Classy.”
Doaa Awaysheh @awayshehd tweets: “Still believe that the best cookies in #Jordan are by @doubletree #Aqaba.”
farah md isa @farahanjuna writes: “Cookies are delish! Omnomnom. @DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel Kuala Lumpur.”1
Raymond Tjandra @Mondrayish tweets, “Props to @DoubleTree for being the first hotel ever to give me an awesome cookie just for checking in. Thank you.”2
And just to make sure guests stay enamored with the cookies, DoubleTree highlights them on their own Twitter page: DoubleTree by Hilton @doubletree. “Sharing deals, travel tips, customer service, our CARE culture, and of course cookies!” says the DoubleTree listing, with a cookie as its profile picture. “It’s all about the #LittleThings that make travel more enjoyable.”3
Could it be that simple? Could a simple cookie turn the tide on a bad hotel stay? Or make a good one seem, somehow, better? Well, yes and no, but as we’ll see in this critical chapter on customer service, clearly . . . every little bit helps.
Remember the last time you had a problem with a brand, company, or service? Maybe your delivery was late, the product was inferior, or you were treated rudely or perhaps not as kindly as you preferred or thought the situation warranted.
What, if anything, did you do about it? Chances are, if you’re like most consumers, you either suffered in silence, wrote to the company via e-mail or letter, or possibly you gave the company’s 800 number a call. But that’s changing fast. In fact, an increasing number of consumers are turning to social media—or social care, as it’s increasingly being called—that is, “customer care” via social media—to get satisfaction.
According to a 2012 study released by NM Incite, what had been a joint venture between Nielsen and McKinsey, nearly half of all U.S. social media users—47 percent—seek customer service through social media channels. The study also found that 18- to 24-year-olds are the highest users of social care, with 60 percent of women and 57 percent of men seeking service through social media.
Some 51 percent of social media users engage in social care more than once a month, and almost 1 in 10 of those individuals use social media for customer service on a daily basis. And just as you start thinking this doesn’t apply to your customers, the study notes that social care use is consistently high across gender and income and education levels. It also translates to positive WOM, as 71 percent of those who have positive social care eventually go on to actively recommend the brand.
Even if a phone number is easily accessible, a full 30 percent of social media users now prefer to contact a brand for customer service through a social channel compared with the phone. Increasingly, customers are taking a pass on using all the previously standard methods of complaints or praise—letters, faxes, telephones, e-mail, and contact forms—in favor of Twitter and Facebook.
Why? Because it’s faster. It’s also more convenient for them, it’s anonymous, and it falls in line with so much of how and why we use social media in the first place: convenience, speed, ease of use, habitual behavior, and so on.
Of course, it’s not just how consumers are contacting companies that is rapidly shifting due to the advent of social media. It is also the lengths they’re willing to go when they feel neglected or ignored.
When customers don’t feel like they’re being heard, one of two things will happen: they’ll go to a competitor or they’ll find a bigger, more public megaphone to get your attention. An innocuous tweet might evolve into a scathing blog post—or even an entire blog— about your business incompetence.
The volume, speed, and public nature of social media is forcing an inevitable convergence of customer service and marketing. When customer complaints and your responses (or lack thereof) are publicly visible in your social marketing, every service interaction becomes another data point in the overall perception of your brand.
The world actually is watching, and every step you take is now available for public consumption. Perhaps it was inevitable, then, that the rise of social media has made customer service the new marketing. Think of it: everyone who approaches your company via, and for, social care is a personalized, targeted, and viable prospect eager to be invited back into the fold:
Your pizza was late? You tweeted about it? Let us make that right for you.
Your cashier forgot to ask you to use your rewards card at the register? You shared that on Facebook? Here, let us show you how to apply those points, plus 500 bonus points, with this simple code.
Your shipment arrived damaged and you posted pictures of the packaging material on your blog? Here is a free Amazon.com Prime membership for one year. Now go tweet about that!
The theater was sold out and you had to sit in the front row for all four hours of Les Miserables? We’re sorry; here is a picture of the entire theater staff having our (very uncomfortable) morning team meeting in the front row—and a couple of free passes for the inconvenience.
Regardless of customer care or social media, responsiveness has always been half of the marketing equation, and personalization the other. Thanks to social media, it is now possible for companies to be (more) responsive by creating a fully personalized experience to deeply understand your customers’ wants and needs, to meet them where they are, and to incorporate social media listening, response, and engagement into your contact center methodologies.
With the growing regularity, omnipresence, and direct impact of social care, it seems natural that consumer brands, in particular, would be fully embracing the shift. After all, here is an opportunity to answer personalized issues with expediency and TLC on an immediate, individual, and case-by-case basis. Basically, here is an open invitation to respond with vigor and practicality and to make converts of (nearly) every complainer.
But that’s not quite the case—yet.
Another recent study, this one by STELLAService, points out how big of a gap still exists between social care and marketing. Only 2 of the top 25 online retailers—Zappos.com and LLBean.com—said they replied to 100 percent of daily customer service questions posted to Twitter. According to STELLAService analysts, in a recent 45-day study, the average for replies within 24 hours was just 44 percent across the top 25 online retailers. What’s more, 6 of the 25 retailers didn’t reply to service inquiries over the same period at all.
For someone like me, who has watched social marketing campaigns succeed by inches instead of feet, who knows that even the smallest details—like a warm cookie at check-in or a personal tweet back from a company customer service representative—make all the difference, such results are even more troubling.
Outside of the retailer study, a general study of consumers using social media for service found that only 36 percent reported that their issue was solved quickly and efficiently (and, I would add, probably personally as well). Furthermore, 14 percent reported that the company engaged quickly but did not solve their issue, and 10 percent reported that they never received a response at all.
Clearly, customer care is an issue for every company, and if you’ve been answering 1-800 numbers and answering the mail since your company started, force of habit can be equally hard to change. But change it must if you are to find the “sweet spot” between marketing and social care.
In 2000, Victor Ciardelli launched Guaranteed Rate, Inc. (www.guaranteedrate.com) to be a different kind of mortgage company. He’d been a leading traditional lender and just knew there had to be a better way.
Sure, he offered low rates and fees. But he also added features and services that allowed his clients to easily understand the mortgage process and transparently evaluate the total cost of a home loan. All with “we’re in this together” customer service.
Guaranteed Rate knew that obtaining a new mortgage or refinancing a home is stressful and filled with complexities that can be overwhelming and confusing. The company focused on being recommended—knowing that if it got that right, all the rest would follow.
It did. Within three years, Guaranteed Rate became Chicago’s largest independent mortgage lender. Today, Guaranteed Rate is the largest independent retail mortgage company in the United States, employing more than 2,800 people in 161 offices and doing business in all 50 states and Washington D.C.
Even more impressive—and indicative of its highly recommended philosophy— Guaranteed Rate has a 77 percent Net Promoter Score, much higher than the 18 percent banking industry average and one of the highest of any company in any industry (in the vicinity of Apple, Costco, Trader Joe’s, and USAA). And the company’s customers give it a 96 percent satisfaction rating with comments like:
“I received an excellent rate and was able to refinance my condo in 30 days. The process was smooth and did not encounter any snags.”
“I just bought my first home and could not be happier. Any questions or concerns I had were immediately addressed, and I was kept up to date on every step of the loan process.”
“Thanks to the recommendation I received from my brother in Chicago, my experience with Guaranteed Rate was great! I heard repeatedly from my listing agent and broker how highly they thought of Joe (mortgage broker).”
So, how do you respond to customers who are eager, even desperate, for a little social care? How do you turn customer service complaints into recommendation gold mines? And finally, how do you join the ranks of such elite folks as Zappos.com and LLBean.com by handling social care in the right way? You can start by finding out where customers are lurking, reporting, chattering, praising, questioning, critiquing, and complaining.
A recent article on TechJournal.com, “Getting Customer Service Right on Social Media Boosts a Brand,” points out that there is a wide variety of social media platforms that consumers turn to for social care, but Facebook and Twitter are clear standouts.
“Among social media users,” the article states, “consumers are most likely to comment on or ask a question about a company’s product or service on Facebook, both on the company’s page (29 percent) and on their personal page (28 percent), followed by the company’s blog (15 percent) and then by Twitter, both on a personal handle (14 percent) and a brand handle (13 percent).”
A recent American Express Global Customer Service Barometer reported that people who have used social media for customer service “at least once in the last year” are willing to spend “21 percent more with companies they believe provide great service”—in contrast with the general population, which is willing to spend 13 percent more.
The American Express Global Customer Service Barometer also found that more than three in five Americans feel companies have not increased their focus on providing better service, and of this group, 32 percent felt businesses are paying less attention to providing good customer service. More than 80 percent of these consumers say they have abandoned a purchase because of a poor service experience.
But there are companies who are doing this right, and one of them is Zappos.com. The company started experimenting with social care on Twitter in 2008. “We weren’t perfect when we got off the ground,” said Rob Siefker, director of customer loyalty at Zappos.com, “but we’ve clearly gotten better at it.”
Have they ever. Of the 500 employees that are part of Zappos .com’s customer loyalty team—which handles e-mail, phone, live chat, and Twitter correspondence—about five full-time members handle all of the tweets. The company built out its own system to alert team members by e-mail when the company is mentioned on Twitter, even going as far as to “crawl” the service for possible misspellings of “Zappos.”
“What we’re seeing is that customers are turning to social media channels for customer service, regardless of whether and where a particular brand is actually equipped to handle customer service over social media,” said Gadi BenMark, senior vice president of NM Incite’s advisory division, in an article on Parature.com.
“Today’s customers choose when and where they voice their questions, issues and complaints. They don’t care if a company is set up to answer customer questions on Facebook, or if it has an actual Twitter handle for customer service. The implications,” BenMark warns, “are enormous for brands that are not implementing effective social care. There is also great upside for those that understand that the lines between marketing and customer service are blurring, and take action to organize, operate and manage performance in this new merged world.”4
So, let’s break down what we now know about social care and put it all together before moving forward:
Very few of today’s top companies respond to every daily customer service question posed using social media.
Many retailers never respond to customer service questions at all.
Companies aren’t responding quickly or efficiently enough for those who do complain.
Or they’re responding quickly but not efficiently; or efficiently but not quickly.
Companies may be waiting for consumers to complain in the carefully designed channels created for them—phone systems, online complaint forms, e-mail addresses—while ignoring when their customers use social media to lodge a complaint, comment, question, or suggestion.
Many consumers feel businesses are paying less attention to providing good customer service.
More than 80 percent of these consumers say they have abandoned a purchase because of a poor service experience.
Over 70 percent of those who experience positive social care (that is, a quick and effective brand response) are likely to recommend that brand to others versus 19 percent of customers who do not receive any response.
The majority of Twitter and Facebook users expect a response from a brand within the same day of posting.
More than 50 percent of Twitter social care users expect a response within two hours of posting.
Obviously, switching from traditional customer care to social care can seem a little like turning the Titanic for many companies, especially larger ones or those particularly resistant to change. But the stakes are high, and the social care trend is only gaining momentum, not slowing down.
How high are the stakes, exactly? It is often said that for every single consumer complaint you do hear about, there are one to two dozen that you don’t. The magnitude of that guesstimate can be staggering when you take into account what you are hearing versus what you’re not. This means that every consumer complaint, no matter where it’s coming in—your 1-800 number, e-mail, website, Facebook, or Twitter—is a vital piece of information you can neither do without nor ignore.
I know this can sound challenging. You’ve gone to all that hard work to set up the proper channels for complaints and service calls to get resolved, and now everybody is using Facebook and Twitter! But as described in the sidebar “Listening to and Acting on What Consumers Are Telling You,” you can use this information to learn how to respond to what consumers are saying in both timely and personal ways.
A recent photograph featured on Eurail’s Facebook page says it all about this 50-year-old travel company and how it has managed to thrive in an industry more associated with the past than the future: Several khaki-and-sweater clad travelers are preparing for a scenic Eurail trip through Romania and Bulgaria circa 1970. Knee socks are prevalent, briefcases are everywhere, and there’s not a cell phone or tablet in sight.
One can imagine that only the train tracks themselves have stayed the same in all that time. Certainly how tourists travel, book their trips, and even complain when things go wrong have evolved light-years beyond when this slice-of-life snapshot was taken.
And yet the company who owns the train in the picture, and on whose Facebook page the candid picture was posted, Eurail, has managed to evolve along with its customers. One can imagine that there are few businesses more “brick and mortar” than train travel. And yet, perusing its social media presence, one can see why such an old-fashioned company has managed to not just survive but thrive in modern times.
Everywhere on its Facebook page you can see the signs of constant chatter monitoring, questions, answers, and above all, service. Nearly every post elicits a random question or two, many unrelated to the original post, but someone from Eurail always responds just the same—with confidence, patience, and vigor!
Their FB page, Liked by 111,000 thousand fans, features travel photos, educational videos, and thousands of Likes and comments for nearly every post. Although the company has been active on FB only since 2006, it has won two prestigious awards for its social care and service: Mashable’s coveted “Best Social Media Customer Service Award” and the “Interactive Media Award” in the travel category from Rail Adventure Itineraries.
You may never have heard of Eurail before and have no desire to visit Europe by rail. And yet few can dispute that this company has managed to embrace the younger generation where they are: online, on Facebook, and in real time. While the company still has the traditional means of handling reservations, booking travel, and answering questions, it’s plainly evident from its social media presence that it is not only quick to respond to consumer questions, concerns, and even complaints but it is also positive and determined to find a solution as well.
It’s easy to be inspired by the proactive nature of a company like Eurail or our earlier examples of DoubleTree, Zappos.com, and LLBean.com. But it can be challenging to refocus your energies when you’re doing your best just to get customers, let alone serve them.
But in these rapidly evolving times, it’s critical that you not only address the topic of social care but also have protocols and procedures in place to ensure that the entire company is consumer focused. It’s no longer a luxury to think this way. It is a necessity if you are to thrive in modern times.
If you think I’m overstating the case or even overreacting to the importance of social media as customer service because I’m simply hypervigilant about it in my career, consider this startling statistic from SocialMediaToday.com: “It is estimated by the end of 2012, 80 percent of companies plan to use social media for customer service purposes. When given positive customer service through social media, around 71 percent of consumers will recommend the brand. Not only will customers recommend the brand, those who engage with companies via social media are likely to spend between 20 percent and 40 percent more money on those companies.”
The evolution of social media is not only blinding but rapidly leaving those who don’t understand or value its power in the dust. The number of Americans who claimed that social media influenced their buying decisions has doubled in the past year alone, and with this emerging trend toward social care, that number is expected to increase exponentially until nearly all of us are influenced, in some way or another, by what we hear, see, and experience online through social media.
We’ve talked a lot in this book about chatter because that is what social media conversations most often sound like to the uninitiated: random chatter that is almost impossible to pinpoint, let alone decipher.
But there is meaning in that chatter. Chatter begins as one individual making one comment, and it spreads as other interested parties respond to that statement with comments of their own. If you see these online conversations as gold mines instead of gossip or claptrap, you will begin to understand their value and importance to your organization.
I admit, the chatter can be overwhelming, even intimidating, at first. But just like any challenge, little things can make a big difference. Here are some simple but effective ways to start turning that chatter into content and applying sound principles today so that you’ll know just what to do with all that chatter tomorrow:
Just wade in. You have to start sometime. Why not now? Why not with your Facebook page? Your Twitter account? Your corporate blog or website forum or even e-mail complaint address? Focus on one portal at a time, and simply wade in. You might be surprised by how clearly the picture of your online brand reputation comes into focus once you start listening to it more effectively—or at all.
Begin to categorize the chatter. As we’ve seen throughout this book, not all chatter is created equal, nor are all customer complaints. Don’t get me wrong: all are critically important, but not every tweet requires a rush to Defcon 4. Some are merely suggestions, while others are specific responses to isolated incidents or outright dissatisfaction. Some are irrational; some are all too rational. It’s important to categorize the chatter so that you can (a) begin to see problem patterns but also (b) begin to develop a personalized but relatively repeatable response for each category.
Prioritize your responses. Every complaint should get a response, every time. That’s the ideal. But on the path to that ultimate destination there should be a system for prioritization so that, at the very least, those complaints marked “medium” to “high” priority are responded to and resolved quickly. For every company, the system might be different, depending on, for instance, how much staff you have devoted to the social business cause, what metrics or measurements you’re using, how big a role technology plays, and so on. But what would be the same across the board is a way of alerting those in authority of when a message, thread, trend, or topic crosses the line from low to medium priority, and particularly when something trends from medium to high priority. What sends something from a medium to high priority? If there’s recognition that this perception of reality might go viral or damage the brand, it should be given a higher priority of response. Inside every organization, the best thing to do is to start a ranking system of extremes. Know what to look out for, what language indicates a danger level, or how many comments indicates a topic is trending.
Be prepared. Finally, know how you want to respond before you respond. I can’t stress this last one enough. Avoid knee-jerk responses, defensiveness, or any kind of “circle the wagon” protectiveness. Listen with an open mind, and respond in kind.
At some point, of course, you will want to do more than just listen; you will want to engage with the consumer as well. Knowing what’s being said first is important to knowing how to engage second.
Marketing has always been about brand reputation, and customer service was always about helping people. For both, step one was to listen to what customers were saying, and eventually I think somebody said, “Hey, why don’t we try and help this guy rather than just note that he’s unhappy?”
—LARRY ROBINSON, Vice President, Product Management, Radian6 Salesforce Marketing Cloud
Naturally, listening and monitoring activities are valuable for information gathering but they are also a prelude to the more active form of engagement. In other words, once you’ve listened and learned what the problem is, it’s time to engage one-on-one with a consumer to respond to and rectify the situation.
The more you listen to online chatter, the more you familiarize yourself with what’s being said about you on blogs and forums, on Facebook and Twitter, you’ll come to understand that social media isn’t about broadcasting. Instead, it’s about connecting.
All of this monitoring behavior is leading up to this: active engagement. And engagement is when you meet customers where they are and interact with them as they are. Look at the folks at Eurail—hopping onto Facebook posts and answering questions, offering suggestions, all with helpful language and useful links.
It’s not about another random come-on or coupon. It’s a distinct and personal response designed to solve a problem, answer a question, or offer a solution before it becomes a problem.
Someone in a thread is asking about the best type of pass to get for a European trip, and someone from Eurail steps in to provide a solution. It’s personal, it’s prompt, and it’s specific. It’s also detail oriented and time-consuming; I get that. It also works, and when you can find a strategy that works, particularly in something as rapidly evolving and constantly demanding as social media, you stick with it!
Customers can be engaged in a variety of ways. For instance, you can respond to a conversation already in progress, such as a discussion of travel itineraries or spaghetti recipes or solutions for athlete’s foot. You can weigh in with a response, you can offer a solution, point them in the right direction, even ask to direct message (DM) them to respond more personally to the discussion and take it off site.
Or you can begin the discussion by doing one of the following:
Asking a question
Posting a poll
Posting a picture
Starting a contest
Trying some other interactive content
Or you can do both: begin a discussion on your Facebook or Twitter pages and follow the thread in a meaningful manner while also offering hints, suggestions, humor, answers, and so on.
Or you can use a discussion someone else started to merge or leap off into a topic you already know people are interested in and discussing. The point in any of the above cases is to be genuine and avoid selling. This is not a broadcast but a conversation. Be specific about your purpose for being there, and leave your marketing and promotional agendas at home.
One thing we should all recognize by this point is how sophisticated and super-aware your social media audience can be. They can smell a bait and switch, come-on, or advertisement a mile away, and randomly inserting some inane marketing speak into a genuine and engaging thread or discussion is one great way to destroy any goodwill your previous engagement efforts might have garnered on your behalf.
Above all, engage with sincerity. It’s okay to thank a customer for a compliment or even constructive criticism. It’s all right to sincerely ask a question or offer a solution. No one can get this right all the time, and if you’re wondering about what to say, pretend you actually are having a conversation. Listening carefully, monitoring closely, and engaging actively are ongoing behaviors, not events.
Let the conversations evolve naturally, and learn as you go. If you’re sincere in your efforts and you have an effective strategy in place, the behavior will not only be appreciated by your customers but it will also become habitual throughout your organization as well.
The bottom line when it comes to social care is that it’s a necessary part of the modern social media landscape. You can’t run from it, hide from it, or even avoid it. And if you have a social media presence at all—and why wouldn’t you?—you must be prepared, and well prepared, to deal with customer complaints via social media.
The sooner you deal with it, strategically, sympathetically, and sincerely, the sooner you will see how social care is far from a chore and more of an opportunity to learn about, meet, identify, and interact with your core audience. For most companies, it’s an untapped resource—a pool of prospects waiting to be approached, consoled, cajoled, interested, invested, and, above all, engaged.
I talk a lot about engagement in this book. That’s because it’s the how to all of this why. It’s the physical representation of all we know and can possibly do about social media. It’s getting one-on-one time with people, actual people, despite the fact that you’re engaging primarily through technology and the Internet.
Engaging is about making connections, and making connections is about finding customers. What better place to find a customer than those places you already know they’re talking about you? What better way to convert skeptics than to contact them directly, suggest something, answer a direct question, or better yet, offer a solution?
Such is the power, and the opportunity, of social care.