I’ve been doing a fair amount of research lately on the various ways social media is used in the call center— common strategies and objectives, metrics, visibility, the whole nine yards.  I find it interesting that several years ago a select few companies dove right into using social media in the call center, in a no holds barred approach, while some are still sitting back and observing in terror (and of course all the stages in between). 

My research has shown me that one of the biggest fears call center managers, supervisors and executives seem to have is agents getting carried away with social media tasks and either not focusing on their customer service jobs (and instead checking in with their friends and tweeting nasty messages about supervisors) or putting out incorrect information that harms the brand.

While it’s true that not every Joe Schmo should be trusted to respond publicly on the internet to your customers, using social media as a motivational tool for agents that have consistently provided outstanding service should alleviate these fears.  Just like you wouldn’t hand the keys to your new Jaguar over to your 15 year old neighbor, you shouldn’t hand the “keyboard reins” over to every agent in your call center.

Focusing on agents who have proven they provide outstanding customer service, via phone or chat, will help you select the right people to be social media ambassadors in your center.  “Promoting” these customer service representatives to be your online brand ambassadors will motivate all your agents to provide outstanding customer service. 

Your new online brand ambassadors (fancy new job title optional) have already shown they know how to handle customers in a positive manner, now you just need to train them to translate those skills to the wide world of social media.  Be sure to work with your HR, marketing and public relations departments ahead of time to have rules and guidelines in place to cover everything from appropriately responding to negative feedback (especially being cautious of the tone your response projects) to whether agents can take time to use social media for personal use at work.  Make these guidelines (and the consequences if they’re broken) very clear to everyone that will be providing service and support through social media.

Just remember— it takes time to perfect new processes, but don’t let this deter you from diving in and experimenting until you get it right.  Who knows, you may end up setting the standards for your industry and having a blog post written about you on InsideInova.com one day!

How has your call center approached social media?  What rules and regulations have you put in place for agents that use social media for service and support?

One of my first blog posts for InsideInova.com was about monitoring social media in the contact center.  I discussed three key ways contact centers can monitor social media in a very strategic way:

1. Set goals and objectives
2. Determine metrics
3. Use a free, or paid, monitoring tool

I was thinking about this post and wondering if I had perhaps jumped the gun a bit.  Working in the marketing world I hear about social media monitoring everywhere— webinars, trade publications, newsletters from marketing vendors and the list goes on and on.  “Social media monitoring” is probably one of the newest and biggest buzzwords to drive businesspeople crazy.  If you’re a call center manager or supervisor, this monitoring task has likely rolled down from upper management and landed squarely on your shoulders as a customer service initiative.  If it’s not your responsibility yet, it probably will be soon.

So before you start planning your approach, what exactly is this social media monitoring thing anyway and why is it so important?

Monitoring various social media outlets (like Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, digg, blogs and so on) is simply keeping a “virtual ear” open for mentions of your company.  In some cases this could also include high profile employees, like Apple’s Steve Jobs.  Tracking what people are saying online about your company is crucial.  For one, customers are no longer telling one or two people about an experience with your company, they’re telling hundreds, thousands and sometimes millions of people over the Internet.

There are countless examples of frustrated customer online rants going viral.  One of the more entertaining is United Breaks Guitars (caution- the chorus will probably replay over and over again in your head) which is now a trilogy of music videos by a musician who checked his guitar, only to have it broken, while flying United Airlines.  The original video went viral on YouTube and has been viewed more than 8 million times.  Only after the video received national attention did United offer compensation for the broken guitar.

Having a social media monitoring system in place allows companies to proactively reach out to customers ranting and raving about a negative experience.  Take Best Buy’s twelpforce; employees scour the Twitter universe for people in need of tech advice.  Best Buy proactively reaches out to them and answers their questions via Twitter.  I can’t think of a better way to position the Best Buy brand as a customer service leader and tech expert.

Social media monitoring provides a great way for you, the contact center manager, to contribute to the bottom line by proactively reaching out to disgruntled customers and improving potential customers’ perceptions of your company.  All of this can be easily, and inexpensively, accomplished.  See my first social media monitoring post for advice on getting started and post your questions and comments below.

For those of you who haven’t jumped on the LinkedIn bandwagon, I encourage you join. Even if you already have an account, chances are you are underutilizing this useful networking tool.

I see LinkedIn as the Facebook of business relationships (except it’s missing the “useless factor” of Facebook, in my humble opinion). It keeps you in touch with current professional contacts, and allows you to reconnect with old colleagues. This networking circle is invaluable if you find yourself unexpectedly without a job, as many have in recent times. I’m sure several of your past colleagues would give you a stellar reference, or perhaps they know someone who is hiring. But what use is this when you find that they have moved on to another job since you last knew them, and the contact info in your Rolodex is sadly out of date? LinkedIn is useful because it has grown to be a central meeting place for professionals, and it is likely that you can find contact information for old colleagues easily.

Like a resume, your LinkedIn profile is a reflection on you as a professional. What do you want it to communicate about you? Spend some time on what we call your “personal brand.” Here are a few tips:

• Keep your profile up to date with details on your latest accomplishments and interests. Include key words relevant to your profession…many recruiters search LinkedIn for prospective talent, and if the words they’re searching for are also in your profile, it’s more likely that your profile will be found. In fact, profiles not only turn up in LinkedIn search results, but also in Google search results.
• Ask for recommendations from colleagues before you need them, while your work is still fresh in their minds. Return the favor and write them a recommendation, or introduce a connection that may be well suited for a business relationship. If your LinkedIn relationships are mutually beneficial, it will pay off in the long run.
• Add a photo to your LinkedIn profile. Many people are visual learners (I’m one of them), and a face to go along with a name is extremely useful when meeting and remembering people.
• If you’ve gone by more than one name during the course of your career, consider using both names in your profile. Many people include a nickname in parentheses or a maiden name prior to their last name. That way, people who know you by either name will be able to find and recognize you when they’re looking to connect.
• Building your network is one of your most important LinkedIn tasks. Some may advocate for connecting with anyone willing to connect, but I take a more conservative approach. You are not likely to get any real value from someone you don’t know, and even less from someone two or three networks away from someone you don’t know. There are plenty of people you have done legitimate business with…request to connect with all of them, and then sift through their connections for relevant prospects.

There is much more you can do to promote yourself on LinkedIn, but this is a good start.

Everyday social media becomes more important in the contact center.  After an especially negative encounter with a company many consumers, both young and old, turn to social media websites to vent about bad experiences and caution friends and family against particular brands.  The problem for businesses today, is that it’s not only friends and family of individual users that “hear” these rants.  Sites like Twitter and Facebook serve as loudspeakers, broadcasting dissatisfaction, and occasionally satisfaction, to millions of people across the web.  In many companies, contact centers have become the hub for monitoring and responding to these online customers.  Here are three keys to help guide you to a successful social media monitoring plan:

1. Determine your objectives and define your goals
   Before you begin scouring the web for every mention of your company name, know what it is you want to accomplish.  Do you want to respond to every person that mentions your company?  Probably not if you’re a huge brand that gets thousands, or millions, of mentions every day.  But if you’re a smaller brand, deeply engaging in conversation with your customers could be highly valuable.  Do you want to respond to positive comments about your company or products?  What about retweeting (or reposting) comments from users?  What kind of value do you want to add to the conversation?  Social media has a lot of potential, but in order to accomplish anything you must know exactly what you want to accomplish and ensure your social media goals and objectives align with corporate goals and objectives.

   Having clearly defined, measurable goals is another must.  Things to consider include: how many followers or fans you have; how often you want to post content; the number of interactions you want to have with people; how quickly you want to respond to comments and the list goes on and on.  Laying out a plan with specific goals will help keep everyone in your contact center aware of what you’re working to accomplish.

2. Determine your metrics
   Once you’ve established your goals, decide what key metrics will help you define success.  Some common metrics include:
   •  Visits to your profile
   •  Mentions per specified time period
   •  Number of inbound links
   •  Referrals to your website
   •  Number of subscribers (followers, fans, etc)
   •  Number of comments and unique commenters
   •  Ratio of positive to negative comments
   •  Recommendations/referrals
3. Employ monitoring tools to assist you
   Social media is just one item on a long list of items that contact centers are responsible for.  Instead of spending hours and hours trying to monitor numerous social media sites on your own, make use of free tools and tools your vendors may already provide.  A quick Google search for “social media monitoring tools” reveals over 4 million results including companies that offer paid monitoring services as well as ideas for free tools.  If spending money on another tool isn’t an option, check with your current vendors to see if their systems can integrate social media with the contact center solutions you already have in place.

Have questions about integrating social media with your Inova Solutions products?  Post them below or contact us today.