Week 3 Assignment, Part 1

Is it just me, or are the assignments getting harder and harder to complete? Once again, I really had to think about my answers. Even after giving some thought to the questions at hand, I wasn't sure how my responses would turn out in the end. I know that this class is Social Media for Business, but maybe what I expected from the title of this class is different than what the instructor has in mind. I am enjoying being challenged regarding my views on social media and its use in our current 21st century business atmosphere. Let's see if I can adequately cover this week's assignment.

Have you ever experienced difficulty communicating with a business?

I will answer that with an unqualified "yes". As I type this post, my mind circles back to a semi-recent experience with my local cable/internet provider. As with most dealings involving your local internet provider it was unquestioningly negative. A quick synopsis, my one year introductory price expired and I was on my provider's website looking for other options. Because I had signed in to my account, the website was filtered to exclude any mention of a lower priced internet plan. I had to sign out and look for pricing as if I was a new customer. This business was targeting their approach to me to prevent me from reducing my service. While I don't consider this a deceptive practice, I do consider the way this company used the technology to do their best to keep me paying a higher price to be decidedly slimy.

Does social media make it easier to get noticed or get your problem solved?

I actually don't think it is easier to be heard as an individual. With a few rare exceptions, I don't see an individual voice being heard any more clearly nowadays with our current social media tools than it was 10 years ago, 20 years ago or even further back. My reasoning is that with virtually equal access to the tools of social media, every person has a voice. When dealing with a large company that has hundreds, thousands or more followers, one voice gets lost in the sea of voices. In my example above, I could have jumped onto my social media platform of choice and lambasted my provider. If my lone experience got noticed by my company, I don't think my problem would be different. Now, if hundreds or thousands of customers somehow banded together to fight the company on this practice through social media, maybe things would change.

Have you ever had a positive experience communicating with a business through social media?

My positive experiences with social media and communications with a company I'm interested in focus on small firms or even individuals as brands. Think motorcycle racers that are their own brand for the purposes of selling themselves to obtain race sponsorships. I have had some very positive interactions with these brands due to the small size of the company (one person in most cases) and have found that social media was a great bridge between me and the company. In this case social media would be my only contact with the company/brand as they are too small for any sort of traditional advertising that would get my notice. My positive experiences have been rewarding for me personally and a few of them have had traction with other customers that ended up benefitting the company.

If it was your own business on social media, how would you respond to positive or negative comments?

Keeping in mind my previous comments, I would have different responses for the type of comments I received. All too often we see shoot-from-the-hip, nasty, vehement, criticism of a company for some perceived slight that usually turns out to be a clear case of the customer NOT always being right. Those types of posts have some traction and nothing a business does really addresses the issue. Time is the only cure for that illness and eventually the nasty comments almost always fade away. I think the best bet for a business trying to deal with this type of contact would be to leave it be. Even though we may feel the burning desire to fight back and defend ourselves, our efforts usually have the opposite intended effect causing even more damage than the original post. As well, quick, short positive comments, while nice, may be so plentiful that trying to send a thank you to every customer that leaves a positive comment may have us working full time just to ensure no one is left out of the accolades.

If I had a business, and I hope to have a small business someday, I would try to tailor my use of social media so that I can have intimate customer interaction, but not get overwhelmed by the use of the tools. I would also limit my use of social media tools to just those that not only allow me to interact the way I want, but also give me good analytics and the ability to control what goes out to the greater world. I would employ resources that emphasize the "social" aspect of social media to eliminate barriers between me and useful, engaging interaction with my customer while still allowing me to focus on my core business without having to fight back against the dragon of bad online reviews.

So after the electronic dust has settled, I have managed to answer the assignment questions after all. I hope my contribution to this assignment provokes some interaction from my fellow classmates and I welcome your comments. Thanks!