Social Networking is Forcing Businesses to Step it Up

In today’s world of social networking and product reviews, businesses are being publicly held accountable more than ever.

This is exactly what happened recently to Macy’s. It seems 48% of their customer complaints were focused on interactions with sales associates.

This poor reputation for bad service was vocalized on social networking sites that enable customers to broadcast negative experiences. On Twitter one customer wrote, “I remember why I don’t shop at Macy’s or Macys.com. Worst customer service ever.” Similar comments were shared on the company’s Facebook page.

Because of digital and portable technology, consumers no longer have to take the time to hand write a letter to a company. They can simply type a quick comment or email to them immediately after the experience using their mobile device.

Macy’s has since turned this negative feedback into a new training program called Magic Selling to all 130,000 of its associates. The acronym “Magic” stands for “Meet and make a connection,” “Ask questions and listen,” “Give options and give advice,” “Inspire to buy,” and “Celebrate the purchase.”

I hope their associates can remember all of that! At Nashville Wraps, our philosophy is simple – “Treat others as you want to be treated.” We believe customers want to be treated as people, not transactions.

If you do receive negative comments on your Facebook page or blog for example, don’t delete them or ignore them. Take a proactive response and let customers see how you are solving the problem. If it is an unfounded comment, your loyal customers will defend you.

Dominos Pizza recently turned around negative customer experiences on food blogs and employee YouTube videos that made the company look bad. After comments that included “the sauce tastes like ketchup,” and “the crust tastes like cardboard,” they knew they had to make a change.

Dominos decided to use social media to their advantage by listening to their customer complaints and responding with a better product because their pizza was finishing last in consumer taste tests.

After two years of research, they completely changed their pizza recipe and promoted it in their advertising and through a new website launch – http://pizzaturnaround.com/. Dominos is encouraging consumers to try the new pizza and offer feedback on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.

Their aggressive marketing efforts paid off. The company reported a double-digit sales increase in third-quarter sales last year. Thanks to mobile pizza orders from iPhones, sales remain strong.

You don’t have to let your business get far off the mark like Macy’s and Dominos did. If you listen and respond to your customers daily like we try to do here at Nashville Wraps, you can resolve most issues before they turn into big problems.

Also, build your business by The Golden Rule, and your customers will find it a pleasure doing business with you.

Buffie Baril
Internet Advertising Manager
NashvilleWraps.com