Social Media Hot Stuff – Don’t get Burned!

Many thanks to Karen Breault and others for suggesting this topic.

If a customer posts a zinger on a blog or networking site, what’s the appropriate response? Jump onto the problem and fix it right away to avoid negative exposure? Ignore it? Or something else?

Consider proactive alerts

There is a range of tools, free and not, that can scour social media for negative comments on your products or company (or positive ones, for that matter!) Marketing groups often use alerts to keep up on the buzz and it may be a good idea for support to join in the monitoring effort — it’s a must if your customers would not think of contacting support, as is often the case in B2C environments.

React quickly

If you wait days or weeks to respond, you might as well do nothing. A public response should be posted within hours, ideally minutes. Note that it’s a response (“we will help you”) not necessarily a resolution.

Don’t hide

Don’t flame back, don’t pretend you don’t work for the company, don’t deny the problem. If there is a readily available solution, say so: “Download version 2.2 at this URL”. If a solution requires more investigation, invite the poster to engage with the support team: “Sorry to hear about the issue you are encountering. How can we help?”. And if the poster is highlighting a known issue, don’t try to deny or minimize it; say, “the website is up and running” rather than, “the outage only lasted 10 minutes” or “the site has never been down for more than a few minutes”.

Reinforce existing support channels

It makes for great PR to hear about the customer who twitted about an uncomfortable bed and miraculously got a call from the front desk proposing an alternate room — but my reaction to that is to wonder why said customer did not just call the front desk in the first place?

Assuming that you have a system in place to respond to customer queries, the right way to handle non-obvious issues posted on social media sites is to graciously invite the poster to contact support. If you choose to provide support through the social media site itself, you just opened another support channel, which may be exactly what you want. If not, direct the poster to the most appropriate existing support channel, whether it’s the phone or an online issue logging system.

Treat the issue as you would an escalation

The added visibility means that you want the poster to get extra TLC. Don’t necessarily allow him or her to jump the queue, but make sure love is lavished appropriately.

Ask the poster to update the original thread upon resolution

It’s best if the original poster agrees to update the original thread with an update on how the matter got handled. A vendor’s response is unlikely to get the same level of credibility.

Educate the executives

Most executives have never run a support organization and they can be exquisitely sensitive to negative feedback, especially when aired in public. We in support have developed a thicker hide and we can share our experience to counsel an orderly response rather than a panicked one that may punish the customers who are working within the system. Keep the executives apprised of the resolution.

Develop your online voice

It’s not an easy task to react promptly, assertively, and kindly to online attacks. Train your team to represent the company professionally, yet with the seemingly effortless casual flair that is so prized with social media. A good approach would be to gather a number of likely negative posts they are likely to encounter and to brainstorm appropriate responses, never taking the bait. Or, let us help you!

Do you have a system in place to deal with social media critics?