Tag: customer service

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Gary Vaynerchuk is Wrong: There is a Social Media ROI

At last year’s LeWeb, my colleague and social media superstar Ayelet Noff asked my favorite wine guy Gary Vaynerchuk the question that we were all hearing in 2009, 2010, and finally forced to answer in 2011: What’s the ROI of social media.

Gary answered that that’s the wrong question – and it’s a problem. Gary asked, “What’s the ROI of your mother?” It’s not about data or Facebook friends or Twitter fans, he said.

He also said that ROI should be “relationship with consumer.”

But ROI of social media is far more than relationships. It’s not just about the The Thank You Economy (though brand goodwill is one tangible ROI measurement)

There are a lot of people getting paid for “social media” consulting because they know how to use Facebook but not measuring ROI. This is how we were all doing it in 2009.

 

emarketer roi

In 2012, it’s time for accountability.

At work, I’ve been a passionate advocate for Twitter – not because I love it (I love whatever tool works) but because it has a high click through rate and is an appropriate tool to integrate with other campaigns to achieve one of my key business goals: qualified leads. But I’ll use whatever tool achieves that goal – Twitter or Facebook, a trade show, or a magazine ad. What matters is achieving the strategic goal – using whatever tool is appropriate given my budget and organization. Social media is part of ecommerce. I’ve made clear sales – actual dollars – directly attributable to blog posts.

What’s the ROI of social media? Here are some possibilities:

  • Sales – immediate, tangible revenue
  • Qualified leads, in whatever form – names/email addresses, downloads, form submissions, etc. – that are targeted and qualified, using your qualification definitions.
  • Lowered costs
  • Customer service questions answered

Define your KPIs first and maybe social media can help you achieve this. On the other hand, maybe not – either way you should be comfortable finding the tool to achieve your KPI.

Here are some answers from Groundswell, Forrester Research’s first book on social technologies, on how social TOOLS can be used to accomplish BUSINESS functions:

groundswell_figure_4-1

The ROI is tangible and quantifiable. Here is another example on how social tools can help save money in customer service can be seen here.

OK, I admit, this title was a bit of link-bait and I’m being a bit unfair to Gary – who knows that the ROI in social media is what we aim to achieve.

In a later interview, Gary made the point that most social media marketers are clowns — talking about Facebook likes and Twitter followers, instead of how social media is a channel to achieve business goals.

Gary made the point that you need marketers who know how to use digital tools to achieve business goals and hiring some 22 year old kid who knows how to use Facebook isn’t the right person to be managing your business.

It’s time to start being accountable – 99.5% of social media “marketers” are clowns – encouraged by marketers who are technoilliterates seeking out the 22 year old kid who doesn’t understand business – those of us who have been doing this for a long time, like Gary, Ayelet, and me all know that this a tool to achieve business results.

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Tropicana Las Vegas Hotel Uses Social Media to Drive Customers and Increase Customer Satisfaction

How does one Las Vegas hotel use review sites like Yelp to gain customers and encourage return customers? Simple: Good customer service and responding to every post, including negative reviews. The Tropicana Las Vegas’s willingness to engage negative reviews and see them as opportunity for improvement is one important key of this Los Vegas hotel’s success in online marketing.

The following is a guest post from Nicole Marshall, Guest Experience Specialist at the Tropicana Las Vegas. Check out their pages on Twitter and Facebook, as well.

Tropicana Las Vegas is changing everything! We have been under new ownership since July 2009 and since then we have been making great strides to change our entire culture, both physical and service related. Social Media plays a very important role in this; as the customer of today is far more technically savvy then that of 10 or even 5 years ago. It used to be if you had a great experience, you would tell your friends and maybe a local newspaper. Now a days you can Tweet, Blog, Facebook or Yelp right from the hotel room or restaurant table. There is no lag time and you reach a much greater audience then your immediate friends. It used to be one person could tell up to 5 people, who tell 5 more and so on. Now, one person can reach 100 people who then tell 150 more and it balloons from there. For Tropicana Las Vegas, this is a great way to get the word out about our transformation.

Having a company website is crucial, but today, you need a larger online footprint to be able to go reach your customers. Facebook is a great avenue for chatter as well as a marketing tool.. The wonderful thing about Facebook and other social media avenues is that you can successfully manage a page or site with very little technical training. If you can point and click, you are in! In order to create a site or page that is engaging and savvy, it does help to have a marketing and customer service related background. After all, if something is boring, you are going to lose interest fast! Everything needs to be done keeping the target audience in mind.

What sets the Tropicana Las Vegas apart is our commitment to excellence and our customer focus. Our Facebook site, for example, is more than just a place for fans to post their comments and share pictures. We post a minimum of three times a week to ensure we are always staying on the minds of our friends without over saturating them. We also answer every post. By doing so, we’ve created raving fans! In addition, we share many of the comments with our team members to ensure it happens again! We also personally assist with reservations. In other words, we treat you like family and not revenue. The response and support from our fans is overwhelming on Facebook. There is nowhere else in the city that you are going to receive such personal and professional “online” service from a real person. We do this not only through Facebook, but through several other “virtual” outlets as well, like Trip Advisor and Yelp.

With the good, there will always be the bad. With a generation of technically savvy customers, if they want to say something negative, they will find an outlet. We welcome this feedback. After all, if we have no idea something is broke, how can we fix it? However, be assured that once you tell us it is broke, we will not only fix it but also invite you back as a “VIP” to prove it to you!

The best suggestion for a company starting to dabble in social media is start small and ensure that you never make a promise you, or your company, cannot deliver on. You have to stay flexible yet consistent, empathetic yet company focused. And remember to have fun with it.