In today’s business world, the only real constant is change. And keeping pace – especially as it relates to evolving trends in customer care – is no easy feat. Yet, it’s critical … considering the growing impact customer care can have on your consumers, your organization, its bottom line – even your own career.

This issue of TelerXpressions provides essential information to help you stay current as well as actionable tips that will help you enhance and elevate the customer care function in your company. Read on to learn how to move forward with social CRM, take the pulse of your existing customer care program and turn "madvocates" into advocates.

Let us know if you have any questions, need more information or have topics you’d like to see featured in future editions of TelerXpressions. Look for the next issue in your inbox in October.

Best Regards,
Linda Schellenger
President, Telerx

Scared to Dip Your Toe? Don't Be

Customer service social CRM. It's the talk of the industry, and it elevates customer care to a greater level of visibility both internally and externally. It also helps you better understand what your customers are saying about your products and how they feel about your company. It's another source of data and another vehicle for growing, enhancing and protecting your brand.

Dipping your toe into customer service social CRM may seem daunting at first. But, if you break it down and tackle it one piece at a time, you will immerse yourself and your company in a whole new world of customer engagement. Here are eight easy tips to get you started.

• Do some research. Find out if your customers are talking about your brand, and if they are, what they ‘re saying. Check out blogs and product review sites. This base level of knowledge will help you determine the appropriate level of social CRM involvement needed and your strategy for moving forward.
  
• Engage other stakeholders such as marketing, product development, market research and sales upfront. Collaboration will help you build a well-rounded, focused program with demonstrated results.
• Determine your objectives and design a strategy that supports your corporate goals. What are the business reasons for engaging in this medium? Who is your audience? What do you want to accomplish? Do you want to solve customer issues? Monitor trends? Create demand? Sell? What is the available budget?
• Identify the tactics. Do you want to observe or participate? Who will manage the communications? How will this initiative be integrated into your current customer service operations? What alerts should be set up? What reporting is required? How will success be measured?
  
• Investigate monitoring platforms. There are many out there with different configurations and benefits. And new solutions come to market frequently. Partner with your IT organization and Telerx to determine the best approach for your organization. There are also many consultants who can help.
• Implement the program. Whether building a dedicated social CRM team or expanding your existing customer care team, successfully engaging with consumers who are talking about your company on social media takes a special skill set. There will likely be trip ups, but if you treat your customers with transparency and authenticity, you can actually drive increased loyalty and foster one-to-one relationships.
  
• Collect data and leverage it. Integrate it with the customer data gathered from other channels. When disseminated across your organization, this holistic view can add tremendous value to your company – insights straight from the source and now faster than ever. Which means actions – from product development to issue management – can now be taken faster than ever.
• Determine the ROI. Early industry predictors indicate a strong return, especially since managing contacts online is less costly than other channels. Plus, the delivery of enhanced customer experiences and the power of positive word of mouth foster increased loyalty and lifetime value.

Want help approaching the world of customer service social CRM?
Contact Telerx at 1.800.2TELERX or click here.

When Was The Last Time You Took a Pulse?

You've been doing this for a long time. So has your customer care team. When was the last time you checked to make sure your program from yesterday still fits your customers' and your company's needs for today?

Take a quick pulse check. To ensure you are providing the ultimate customer experience, make sure you:

• Know your current customer. Has the demographic changed? Have thought leaders and influencers evolved? Are you everywhere they want you to be … on the channel they want, when they want it and on the device they use?
• Take a look at your self-service offering and the speech recognition technology you employ. Do they – as you know from your own personal experiences with self service – add to or detract from customer satisfaction?
• Collect and pass data across channels. You know how annoying it is to have to repeat the same information every time you contact a customer service department … and even worse, when you are transferred from place to place within one call. Savvy customers expect you to have a record of every contact they’ve had with you no matter what channel they use. Providing a 360-degree view of all interactions is critical for increasing satisfaction levels and reducing resolution time.
• Provide consistent information and answers across all channels – like your website, customer care team and self-service options – as well as standardized ways of handling service requests across all channels.

It’s never a bad time to step back and review the basics. It’s a good exercise that will help you not only ensure you are delivering best-in-class customer experiences, but also potentially provide a launch pad for taking your initiative to the next level.

Turning "Madvocates" Into Advocates

Bad news still travels fast according to the latest research published by COLLOQUY¹, a leading provider of loyalty marketing, publishing, education and research.

Slightly more than one out of four of the nearly 3,300 U.S. consumers COLLOQUY surveyed said they are far more likely to spread the word about a bad experience than a good one. While that's not necessarily new news, the fact that this group includes brand champions who are loyal to, engaged with and willing to recommend brands they like may be.

Brand champions can spread the good word – or turn into "madvocates" as COLLOQUY calls them – based on the treatment they receive. We all know bad news travels faster than ever in today's world of viral word of mouth, so be proactive by:

• Ensuring consumers have the opportunity to dialogue – not monologue – with your brand … and each other. Start the conversations by asking for opinions and insights, and recognize contributions.
• Involving customers in word-of-mouth programs by forming online social sharing communities, panels and co-development platforms.
• Being innovative and making sure content is relevant, fresh and rewarding. Change your marketing mindset from "incentive" to "service." Nip any service problems in the bud, and stay on top of social media so you can head off any negative word of mouth from these well-connected customers that can quickly go viral.

The good news is you can turn negative reviews into positive word-of-mouth marketing by quickly responding to them. According to the recently published Retail Consumer Report² commissioned by RightNow and conducted by Harris Interactive:

• 18% of consumers who published a complaint or negative review on a social networking or review site and were contacted by the businesses they complained about were so satisfied with the responses that they made additional purchases and became loyal customers.
• 33% of those contacted turned around and posted positive reviews.
• 34% deleted their original negative reviews.

Nearly one out of every three survey participants did online research, demonstrating the power of online reviews. That makes it critical to continually monitor your online reputation, respond quickly to negativity and make sure the information consumers find about your brand is positive and accurate. Know what's being said and promptly jump into conversations so you can turn madvocates into advocates.