Targeting Socially Loyal Customers: Part 2
Second of two parts (part one).
Just about every business senses the need to develop a presence on Facebook and Twitter, the two goliaths of social media. Each has created a critical mass of users who individually have the potential to influence the attitudes, opinions and purchasing behaviors of thousands. Businesses simply cannot afford to sit on the sidelines and not participate in these forums.
When thinking Social, think Cross-Channel
Today’s social media and mobile marketing groups have an opportunity to work together and add value to one another’s efforts. In doing so, they also can improve their results and contribute directly to the top and bottom lines.
They key is to recognize:
1. Anyone who participates in your brand’s social media presence is engaged on some level and is worth identifying if at all possible.
2. The onus is on the business to separate those who have a positive point of view from those who do not. Understanding those who hold a “neutral” point of view is also important. Everyone who participates, if not already a customer, has the potential to be.
3. Many efforts focus on identifying and mitigating the risk of complaints, yet the majority of “followers” to a brand are interested in having a positive relationship.
4. It’s insufficient to focus on growing your base of “followers” as a metric of success, unless you are able to pull these customers into formal marketing efforts within and outside the boundaries of the given social media site.
It is at this point that the social media and marketing teams must come together to identify “socially loyal” customers. To do so, marketing must be able to uniquely identify customers in the social universe such that they can be directly engaged via digital channels like mobile and email. Cross channel marketing solutions are emerging to tackle this very challenge.
Continued on the next page
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