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What is Social CRM?
Social Customer Relationship Management or social CRM is one of the effective and advanced ways for businesses to interact with customers through various social media platforms like LinkedIn and Facebook. Social Customer Relationship Management integrates social media portals with customer relationship management (CRM) system to offer intelligent insight into customer interactions with a brand, and to enhance the quality of customer engagement. In a nutshell, social CRM is a unique method that can be used by businesses to establish customer relationships by using various tools on social network platforms.
Traditional V/S Social CRM
Traditional CRM is a lot different from social CRM. Traditional CRM primarily stores and streamlines customer vital information like names, company details, geographical location, and transaction history and so on. Traditional CRM fetches customer information mostly from email and phone conversations, through company records or data fed by a customer in survey or feedback forms.
On the other hand, Social CRM offers better advantages in comparison to traditional CRM as it fetches the customer information through social media portals like LinkedIn and Facebook that helps businesses in offering far better customer service in a more personalized manner that is a rage of marketing domain now.
The sales and marketing world has witnessed a plethora of changes in recent times. The dynamics of the sales and marketing domain is transforming rapidly. To match the pace of these frequent changes and to be updated with new and advanced sales and marketing tactics businesses need to be on their toes all the time. Gone are the days when consumers used to buy products and services just by going the words of the sales and marketing professionals. With the arrival of the internet, the dynamics have been transformed dramatically and consumers are smarter now. They surf multiple websites, check reviews and feedback on products and services they looking forward to buy.
They also check and ask their social community members about the products and services they need to buy and then they make any buying decision. In such scenarios, Social CRM acts as bliss for sales and marketing professionals to target the consumers effectively and in a personalized manner. This is because Social CRM is not based simply on customer information but it is built on the kind of conversation consumers make with the business on different social media platforms. This helps sales and marketing professionals to build personalize and strong relationships with consumers. On the other hand, Traditional CRM is based on direct advertising to collect customer information to target campaigns at a specific audience and aims to retain existing clients.
This, Social Customer Relationship Management helps sales and marketing professionals to craft a better roadmap to consumers, offers faster and enhanced customer service through a consumer & preferred social media portal, and enables customers to share their experiences with billions and billions of people online.
Kind of followers
Social CRM also gives a detail view of a number of followers and also enables businesses to know how many are actively following their social media platforms and engaging with their content.
Total Traffic
Social CRM calculates the total traffic and conversion rates happening through social media portals. This calculation helps businesses to know how many consumers visit their website and how many of them click and convert into a customer.
Customer Engagement
Social CRM not only calculates the number of clicks and measure traffic to a website but it also gives a detailed picture of customer engagement happened through conversations made.
Brand Visibility
Social CRM is also very helpful in gauging how many followers are talking about a company or brand, and if those consumers and visitors are sharing their experiences via social media portals.
Difference between Social CRM & Social Media
Social media is nothing but integration of various social networking platforms entailing various networking portals like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. These various social media portals are used by consumers to express their views on particular products or services they have used and they share their positive and negative feedbacks on these portals. On the other hand, Social CRM enables businesses to know what customers are speaking on social networking platforms about any brand or business, that helps businesses to cater to the needs of consumers effectively and in a personalized manner.
The power of social CRM cannot be denied and ignored as it is based on the power of community participation and collaboration. These two features are inherent in social media and play a vital role in social media strategy. Yes, it is a fact that there are certain risks as well that are inevitable when inviting community participation. Businesses can’t control all the time what consumers speak about any brand on any social media platform. But yes, businesses can keep a close track of consumers’ posts and feedback. Businesses can respond to consumers’ feedback and reviews, and engage with them positively that encourages constructive discussion. With the help of social CRM businesses can analyze consumers’ reviews, feedbacks, concerns, complaints, and demands and then devise creative and effective alternatives to participate in conversations with consumers.
Another aspect of Social CRM that is highly beneficial for businesses that it empowers businesses with the power of tracking the market’s latest trends and gives a detail view of what consumers are speaking about their business or any other company. Social CRM enables businesses to know what consumers actually feel about particular business products and services that enable businesses to address consumers’ needs and pain points effectively. With the help of social CRM, businesses get early alerts of any negative feedback given by consumers on social networking platforms. This helps businesses in addressing consumers’ pain points at the very beginning of dissatisfaction. It enables a business to mitigate if any damage to company reputation happened at an initial stage. Thus, Social CRM also offers a unique platform where businesses can address consumers’ concerns quickly and effectively. As we know, any negative feedback can go viral in today’s time and can spoil the complete reputation of the company but with the help of social CRM, businesses can address dissatisfied customers instantly.
Besides controlling the negative feedback and addressing consumers’ pain points businesses with the support of social CRM can also generate and disperse useful content related to their products and services. Social CRM harnesses the power of various tools that enable businesses to track customers’ feedbacks and reviews and can identify the most influential customer who spread across the positive word of mouth about your company and whom other people look to for information and guidance. Once businesses gain knowledge of these key influencers, they can reward them that result in the goodwill of the company.
Advantages of Social CRM
Social CRM is a personalized and unique way to connect with consumers
effectively. Incorporating social CRM as a central component of business can
create wonders and offers great advantages that are as follows
Advantage 1
Customer Retention
As we know customer loyalty towards any business gets enhanced if customers’ queries are solved quickly. On the same note, social CRM offers a great advantage to businesses when it comes to retaining customers for a longer time period. It allows businesses to address customers’ issues, challenges and complaints quickly and effectively. This approach results in an enhancement of the level of trust in customers’ minds. Besides solving issues social CRM also enables businesses to know what their customers feel about their products and services and businesses also get to know their customers’ lifestyle and buying interests that help them to craft and cater to the products and services as per the customers’ needs and choice.
Social CRM enables businesses to devise social media strategies that enable them to interact with consumers effectively. This approach makes the consumer feel privileged because they are getting heard and they feel good when they have been asked for their suggestions in making products and services better. So by doing all these businesses make sure their customers are loyal to them and encourage them to spread positive word of mouth.
Advantage 2
Quick Lead Generation
Another advantage of social CRM is a quick lead generation that helps businesses to grow sales. Social CRM enables businesses to upload relevant content on social media platforms that address consumers’ needs, pain-points, and encourage consumers to reap out the maximum from the products and services that result in quick lead generation. Besides this, with the positive word of mouth and reviews your existing customers put on social media platforms encourage their friends and family to trust on your products and services too that result in increased ROI.
Advantage 3
Stronger Brand Presence
Undoubtedly social CRM is the most effective and personalized way for businesses to connect with consumers. Social CRM offers ample of opportunities to business nowadays to mark their presence globally. In order to enhance the brand presence of a business, these social networking platforms are playing a vital role. The contribution of social CRM in modern tactics of sales and marketing is truly exceptional as it offers a platform for businesses to showcase their products and services in a manner that appeals to the consumer directly. Social CRM harnesses the power of customer engagement and conversations that happen on social media portals. These group discussions of businesses and consumers act as a catalyst in making any brand’s presence stronger.
With the help of social CRM numerous tasks can be done that can enhance the brand presence of any business effectively. For example, a business can promote content entailing the features of their products and services they offer in the form of awareness related blogs or how their products and services can be helpful to their buyers. By posting these blogs businesses can encourage more participation of consumers. Consumers can gain valuable insights regarding products and services and can also comment on blogs that generate customer engagement too. Businesses can also post their website blogs’ links on their social medial portals that invite more customer engagement and hence boost the brand presence. Besides these practices, a business can also identify the key influencer who spread positive word of mouth regarding their business and can reward that influencer. This gesture generates a level of confidence in customers’ mind and they feel special because their feedback is not only getting heard but also getting implemented.
Advantage 4
Reduce support costs
For any customer, it is very frustrating to call and wait on IVR for long minutes just for asking a simple query or registering a complaint. This irritates the customer and they get more dissatisfied. However social media platforms offer great help to customers where they can discuss their issues and businesses can also directly address customers & issues in a better-personalized manner. This approach saves a lot of time for both customer and business and also effective in reducing the support cost of a business.
Thus, social CRM is effective in targeting leads, converting them into customers and as well as boosting the brand presence globally. Any business today irrespective of their size small, medium or large can opt for social CRM in order to draw a roadmap to success. The power of social CRM is dramatically changing the dynamics of the sales and marketing domain where content and customer engagement plays an essential role and guarantees a boost in business growth. The reason behind social CRM success and why businesses love to implement it in their business process is because social CRM offers businesses an approach that encourages them to educate consumers with their content and not pushing them to buy. Educating consumers always enhance the feeling of trust among consumers that results in quick customer acquisition and better sales.
Advantage 5
Better Lead Conversion
Social CRM also offers a great way to boost lead conversion. As a better understanding of consumers’ interests and needs are gained by sales and marketing professionals, it enhances the chances of lead conversions dramatically.
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