Last Tuesday marked the first of a series of thematic half day seminars that 6Consulting will be hosting on a quarterly basis. Customer Service 2.0 Proactive and Social looked at what impact social media was having on the customer service landscape and how perceptions around service related interactions were fundamentally changing.

“Social Customer Service is generating considerable interest across major businesses in the UK. 6Consulting’s Customer Service 2.0 event provided a rounded picture of the tools that help facilitate online engagement, the business impact to anticipate customer needs, as well as best practise models and the importance of understanding the enterprise-wide implications and benefits of doing so.“

– Guy Stephens, Senior Consultant at Foviance and guest speaker at Customer Service 2.0 (more…)

So you’ve looked at social media, you know there’s value, and now you want to get your business involved. Where do you start and how do you do it?

Listen – Engage – Measure

If you’re thinking of getting your business involved in social media make sure you have a plan. In most cases your plan will include three key dimensions; Listening, Engaging and Measuring.

In the first instance your initial listening or buzz monitoring initiatives will be pivotal in clarifying how your business will benefit and what value you will add when engaging. In addition to this, having an understanding of current conversations will help you to create clear-cut goals which will ultimately feed into how and why you engage online as well as how you will go about measuring your success.

Listening 2.0

There is always a lot of chatter surrounding why companies should listen, but how does it actually create value. This is where engagement comes in and where listening goes beyond simply tracking a campaign, sentiment or ReTweets. Make engagement a natural part of the process as it will allow you to:

1. Understand industry discussion and be a leader in your space.

Knowing how your competitors are engaging and what your customers, prospects or supporters want will help you reach out online to the right person at the right time and in the right place. Beyond the online space, managing buzz effectively can not only help feed into your social media strategy, but can also have enterprise-wide repercussions, helping you to understand your product, your customers needs and the way your brand is received, with much more clarity

2. Engage at a point where you can create value.

This might mean helping your customers with problems, being a thought leader and contributing to the industry discussion while sharing content from others that might be of value. Demonstrate the fact that you are listening and paying attention but be more than just reactive and stay ahead of the curve.

Trial and Error

If you listen first you’re already a step ahead. However, you’re not always going to get it right. As with any new idea, product or initiative you will learn from your mistakes and develop your social media strategy on an on-going basis. Social media is constantly evolving, at a fast pace, so cut yourself some slack and do it better next time.

Shout About Your Achievements

Ensuring that your social media presence is paying off is much more than just getting the reporting right for your superiors. The metrics will help but it’s really about company buy-in, from the new intern to the COO but this is only going to happen if you’ve got a story to tell. Make sure that you shout about your achievements across the organisation, differentiate yourself from your competitors and be an ambassador for your team, your business or your industry. By using the numbers and KPIs to your advantage you will make the most out your social media engagement and even eventually find your niche within this space.

Earlier this month we looked at how some of the larger telecommunications companies in the UK were faring in social media. The levels of engagement as well as the way in which their outreach was received varied considerably from company to company. Generally one would expect companies that are driven by technology, like BT, O2 and Vodafone, to be active in social media, but we wondered how this translated to other industries.

To this end we undertook some research analysing the reputation of ten water and sewerage companies in social media over a three-month period. We found that while OFWAT, the Water Services Regulation Authority, measured the companies on security of supply, customer service and environmental impact, this is largely done through traditional methods. Using our own team of social media analysts we decided to measure the same key areas as expressed and captured throughout social media. Our in-depth Industry Insight Report includes a rigorous analysis of:

• engagement levels amongst the companies
• share of voice
• sentiment towards these companies
• competitor  reviews and;
• key recommendations.

Our Water Industry report includes the following key insights:

• The spectrum of Social Net Promoter Scores (SNPS) was extremely broad. Across the ten companies reviewed the highest and most positively regarded Wessex and Northumbrian scored +56% and +40% respectively and the lowest scored -20%.
• We also found that environmentally conscious programs were of particular interest to social media users and tended to cultivate a positive response.
• Blogs and micro media (predominantly Twitter) were the dominant locations for discussion. However forums were also an important place for exchanges, hosting a significant proportion of negative sentiment towards several companies.
• Evidence of engagement with consumers was low over the monitored period. In fact our research found that customer service issues relating to the companies accounted for the lowest SNPS for all of the companies reviewed.

Our monitoring captured over 2,300 mentions of customer service issues. While such conversations can be controlled and tended to within social media to a good extent if companies were to engage, our research showed that most were noticeably silent.  Although various key players within the water industry might be monitoring social media, they remain disengaged rather than proactive. All of the 10 water companies reviewed scored an SNPS below +20% on customer services, and six scored a negative SNPS. Clearly more attention needs to be given to customer service. Proactive outreach within social media should factor in both company policy as well as future OFWAT assessment.

If this has sparked your interest and you would like to review the research in further detail you can order the full report by contacting info@6consulting.co.uk .

While social media as a corporate communications channel is gaining ground, it’s still seen as a rather new and novel medium. As a result of this, and because there is a level of uncertainty with regards to its benefits, there seems to be a large demand for case studies and practical examples of corporate social media use.

With this in mind we will be sharing a number of case studies on our Blog over the next couple of months. First up, we highlight how we worked with Kellogg’s UK who were looking to roll out a social media strategy across their business.

To begin Kellogg’s sought to understand, in detail, what was being said about their brand and four of their main product groups; Coco Pops, Special K, Crunchy Nut, and Rice Krispies Squares. Working with 6Consulting, Kellogg’s launched a listening and monitoring initiative. The insight gained through this was then used as a basis for future cross departmental social media involvement. (more…)

There’s no doubt that social media has had a big impact on customer service. We’ve seen companies exceed expectations by being proactive and going out of their way to answer customer queries quickly and effectively. These recent developments however have also raised our expectations and we’ve seen customers end up thoroughly disappointed while tweeting their issues at a dormant corporate account in vain.

In anticipation of National Complaints Day, Foviance is organising a roundtable event on August 12^th to discuss exactly what impact social media has had on customer service. The likes of Warren Buckley from BT, Paul Hopkins from Thomas Cook and Rob Skinner from PayPal UK will be speaking alongside our very own Sullivan McIntyre who will share some of the insights we’ve gained over the years in working closely with large corporate customer service departments implementing their social media strategies.

The roundtable discussion will explore how companies are working towards effectively integrating social media channels in customer service. In addition, speakers will also share some of the challenges this has posed and look forward to what the future might hold.

If you’re interested in what companies are doing on this front and our own experiences in this field, follow the discussion on the day: either search #ncd2010 on Twitter or download a full report of the findings through the National Complaints Day website.

Happy National Complaints day!

The Financial Times Stock Exchange (FTSE) 100 Index highlights the 100 most capitalised companies publically listed on the London Stock Exchange. These companies are widely considered to be the most influential and are revered across the business world. However, success in business does not always equate to success in the mind of the public.

Achievement in the public sphere is difficult to quantify. While revenue, profit and volume of employees are all solid and commonly accepted measures of business performance, these figures do not correlate directly with success in the public’s eye.

Companies should be aware of how the public perceive them in social media: conversations online can go viral and tarnish a company’s reputation over the long term. Large corporates’ reputations can be quickly impacted if they have no effective social media strategy in place to protect them.

While traditional market research can be used to gain a degree of insight into the public consciousness, it is time consuming and never perfectly representative. Social media monitoring tools such as Radian6 allow for the collection of data in real time, enabling analysis of large volumes of relevant public conversations.

The 6Consulting Solution

6Consultings Professional Services Team analysed mentions of five FTSE 100 companies in social media for Q2 (1st April through 30th June 2010) in follow up to our earlier work on the FTSE 100. The number of mentions of each company in social media was measured using Radian6. Mentions of the major corporations made up the search terms, rather than subsidiary companies or products. Sentiment analysis was manually assessed by 6Consulting’s social media analysis team to provide insight into the public perception of the chosen companies.

The following companies were chosen for monitoring due to their involvement in recent media stories:

• African Barrick Gold - Recently added to the FTSE 100
• British Airways – Suffered at the hands of striking cabin crew
• British Petroleum (BP) – Criticised for the Deepwater Horizon oil leak
• British Sky Broadcasting Group (BskyB) – Rejected a buyout offer from News Corp.
• The Royal Bank of Scotland - Recently posted improved year-on-year financial results

Through sentiment analysis, a Social Net Promoter Score (SNPS) for each company was calculated.  This single figure metric devised by 6Consulting highlights public attitude towards an organisation expressed through social media and has evolved from the Net Promoter Score methodology.

The Results

Unsurprisingly, BP had the largest number of mentions in social media of the five companies, being mentioned 1,831,873 times over the monitored period. This is an extraordinary level of mentions for a single company. However, large levels of mentions and revenue do not mean public sentiment is necessarily positive:

Fig 1: Table showing the five companies in order of their SNPS (revenue figures from corporateinformation.com)

The above table highlights that although Africa Barrick Gold has the lowest volume of mentions and revenue of the five companies; it is more positively regarded in social media compared to the other companies. Much of African Barrick Gold’s positive sentiment was generated though buzz surrounding their addition to the FTSE 100 index.

The terrible score achieved by BP in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon oil leak is the worst of the five. However, note that three of the five companies attract more comments from detractors than promoters: BP’s situation as a large corporate struggling in the public eye is not unique.

British Airways and The Royal Bank of Scotland both attract criticism from social media users. The airline suffered due to sympathy expressed towards striking cabin crew, while RBS was still attracting negative sentiment after its near collapse in 2009.

Sentiment expressed towards BskyB was 90% neutral. Social media users spread news of the company without expressing much sentiment towards the broadcasting corporation.

Fig 2: The five companies in terms of revenue, SNPS and number of mentions

The above chart further highlights a rough correlation between high revenue and criticism in social media. The size of the bubbles relates to the number of mentions the company received, the position along the horizontal axis represents the company’s revenue, while the SNPS of each company determines their vertical position.

High grossing companies on the FTSE 100 index should take stock of what is being said about them online as social media continues to grow in importance and influence. The continued growth of social media suggests it will ultimately play a role in the success of a company. Public reputation is difficult to salvage as The Royal Bank of Scotland has discovered, a year on from its near collapse.

There’s been a lot of discussion recently about social media governance, but what does this actually mean and what impact does it have on businesses? While governance is often shied away from in our online world of unstructured information, increased control or ‘governance’ of social media is not necessarily a bad thing. Controls are needed, whether this is with regards to what you say on paper, in emails or within social media, should be irrelevant. The question is; how can companies manage social media governance effectively and efficiently?

Social media governance simply put is the control a company has over social media usage by itself or its employees. While the FINRA (the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority) 10-06 Regulatory Notice on social media involvement for regulated businesses has created some buzz, social media policies, procedures and guidelines are gaining in popularity all around. The benefit of effective social media governance transcends industries.

Social media can be daunting for companies; potential record keeping requirements would easily tip the proverbial scale when it comes to approving a business case for it. As a shared medium, often across an entire organisation, social media initiatives understandably require a certain degree of consistency.

Ensuring this means infinite record keeping and tracking: what have employees said, to whom and where. The perfect controls call for a balancing act that mitigates risk whilst allowing the social media brand ambassadors enough flexibility to properly do their jobs. Inexperience in addressing this has the potential of becoming a very time consuming Excel driven affair. Realising that there are tools out there that can help track and record is often half the battle but not always considered.

As social media governance and compliance becomes more prominent in the UK it has the potential to help rather than hinder businesses, regulated or not, to adopt basic rules of engagement for social media as well as effectively manage ongoing campaigns. Clients and consumers will benefit because this will mean that social media participation steadily increases amongst businesses.

The act of uniformity and on brand engagement however should not become a burden which ultimately prevents companies from conversing and engaging, especially smaller ones for which using social media is not only a competitive advantage but part of their business model.

Olivia Landolt

Marketing and Community Manager

@6Consulting

On the 6th of May voters took to the polling stations to elect their M.P.s. The result was one not seen in the UK since 1974; after all the campaigning, ‘Clegg-mania‘ and ‘bigotgate‘ the result was indecisive; a hung parliament.

Prior to the election, political and market analysts were either promoting the idea of a hung parliament giving good cause for electoral reform, or denouncing the result for fear that political uncertainty would have a negative impact on the economy.

So, we have had a good week to get our heads around the idea of David Cameron and Nick Clegg working together running the country. What do social media users think of the coalition? Do they express a positive or negative sentiment towards the current hung parliament?

Radian6′s automated sentiment analysis tool allows the user to survey and assess a large sample in real time or over a specific date range. The social media research that 6Consulting conducted covered posts between the 6th and 17th May. This immediately follows the hung parliament result and covers the period when the coalition government between the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats was formed.

In terms of sentiment, over the monitored period there were more positive posts about the election result than negative ones. The chart below highlights the disparity between the two:

Figure 1: Sentiment expressed towards a hung parliament 6/05 - 17/05

4,397 posts were automatically analysed for sentiment towards a hung parliamnet:

• 64% were deemed to have a positive sentiment,
• 33% were deemed to have a negative sentiment.

There were over twice as many posts expressing a positive sentiment towards a hung parliament. Prior to the election, some traditional surveys had suggested that the public were evenly split in terms of sentiment towards a hung parliament. This changed following the result and when the coalition government was established.

What are these social media users saying? Word clouds highlight frequently used words in a selection of posts. Those expressing positive sentiment said:

Figure 2: Frequently used words in posts with a positive sentiment towards a hung parliament

We can also see the frequently used words included in posts with a negative sentiment towards a hung parliament:

Figure 3: Frequently used words in posts with a negative sentiment towards a hung parliament

A word which stands out in posts with negative sentiment is ‘uncertainty‘. This was a major concern for market analysts prior to the election, but is not such a large issue for social media users following the result.

Where in social media have people been discussing the hung parliament? Blogs were the most dominant hosting platform, closely followed by micro media (predominantly Twitter).

Figure 4: Popular media types for hung parliament discussion

The media types are quite varied; blogs and micro media are at opposite ends of the social media spectrum. Where blogs allow for the author to express their view at great length and detail, Twitter is restricted to 140 characters. So while social media users were making short, passing comments about the prospect of a hung parliament, they were also composing longer tracts on the situation.

Social media played a positive role in the election, being a place where the public could comment on and discuss aspects and events throughout the campaigns. Moving forward, social media users remain interested in the result, closely following where the new coalition government will take the country next.

David Barber

Data Analyst at 6Consulting.

Twitter: @davidbarber6c

In May this year the United Kingdom will once again fall into election fever as political parties increase their presence in all forms of media to try and win votes.  In previous elections traditional media sources were utilised to push election messages.  Billboards, newspaper stories and party political broadcasts after Eastenders were all part of raising awareness of the major parties and their agendas.  This year, the parties have a new challenge – to harness social media.

Here at 6Consulting we’re of the opinion that social media is a useful tool for campaigns, whether corporate or political.  Not only can social media reach a vast audience, it can also be done at relatively little cost, making it an efficient and effective tool if harnessed properly.  In the simplest terms, without even thinking about engagement and influence, a presence in social media makes the parties visible to those who may just change the channel when the party broadcasts come on.  If political parties do dabble in social media, we can monitor their activities and gauge sentiment towards them in real time.

While the influence of social media on this election campaign remains to be seen, we can monitor the recent level of buzz around the parties and attempt to predict a result based on their current social media presence.

Using Radian6 to do a bit of top level social media monitoring, I decided only to focus on the main three parties:

• Gordon Brown and the Labour Party
• David Cameron and the Conservative Party
• Nick Clegg and the Liberal Democrat Party

The chart below shows the level of mentions of these parties and their leaders in social media from the beginning of January

Figure 1: Levels of Party Conversation Over Time from January 2010

It is clear that the Political Parties are mentioned a huge amount in social media.  There were thousands upon thousands of mentions of the parties, many relating to M.P’s recent scandals.  Yet not all of these mentions are related to the election; I only wanted to find chatter surrounding the parties when they are mentioned with the upcoming general election.  I refined my Boolean for the search and paired mentions of the parties and their leaders with the word ‘election’.  The results were reduced to a manageable level to make my prediction and can be seen in the charts below:

Figure 2: Share of Social Media Voice Between the three parties from January 2010

Figure 3: Levels of Party Election Conversation over Time from January 2010

Between the beginning of January up to the 23rd March:

• Labour dominate Election conversation with around 50% of the mentions over the monitored period. However, their mentions fluctuate greatly and although they are consistently higher than the other parties, the trend is prone to dramatic spikes suggesting conversation is unstable.
• The Conservative Party have a strong social media presence which is more consistent than Labour’s.  The largest spike occurs during the party’s conference.
• The Liberal Democrats had a smaller social media presence, yet with nearly 15,000 mentions, this is still strong.

The conversation levels are very high.  The parties command a level of conversation that many companies would wish to emulate.

Analysis of this data shows that Labour have a significantly higher level of election chatter around their party than the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats.  While the Liberal Democrat election chatter remains steady with a few spikes over the monitored period, the Labour chatter remains at a higher base rate and spikes frequently.  Conservative Party conversation is relatively steady at a level between Labour and the Liberal Democrats, but spikes on the 28th February.  Drilling down on the spike in Radian6 it is clear there was widespread reporting of David Cameron’s keynote speech at the Conservative Party Conference in Brighton in which Mr. Cameron admitted the election would be close:

Figure 4: Radian6's River of News for 28/02/2010 Conservative Spike

The story was the highest peak in both Conservative and Labour Party election conversation.  The reason both Parties see a spike is because the articles mention both parties side by side, seeing them as the two front runners in the election race.  The Liberal Democrat election related conversation also spikes on the same day, but at a much lower level.  A word cloud from the day highlights the focus of the coverage in social media:

Figure 5: Frequently Used Words in Social Media 28/02/2010

If I were to predict the result of the General Election purely on this piece of social media analysis, I would assume that the Conservative and Labour Parties are the most popular and newsworthy of the three.  The two clearly have more social media coverage than the Liberal Democrats.  If I were a betting man I would rule out the Liberal Democrats for this particular race and put my money on the Labour Party.

In conclusion, the debate over social media and its function in election campaigns rages on.  The Daily Telegraph has recently launched a debating section of its site, in which the presence of social media and sentiment towards the main parties is tracked and updated.  Clearly the social media aspect of this election is being recognised, it could potentially alter the balance over time.  In my opinion, if the parties’ social media interaction reaches out to more people and encourages voting, then it’s nothing but a good thing!

David Barber

Data Analyst and Research Assistant

@davidbarber6c

LEADERS IN UK PUBLISHING AND MEDIA TO GET TOGETHER TO DEBATE THE IMPACT OF TWITTER ON THEIR BUSINESSES

Media140 will be the UK’s first micro-blogging event, bringing together the worlds of print, broadcast, online and social media together to debate and discuss the impact of new micro-blogging services such as twitter and how they are changing how news is being sourced and consumed.

The non profit event to be held at Iris Digital on the 20th May is being sponsored and supported by Sky News, Telegraph, Iris Digital, Sun Microsystems, 6Consulting, Tweetmeme, Winston & Strawn Bootlaw, Times Online, Capital Business Media and Gorkana.

With speakers from mainstream media including BBC, The Times and Sky and their new media counterparts from Frontline Club and TechCrunch with a number of respected technology critics, commentators and academics scheduled to attend.

This event shows how the industry is starting to look across commercial boundaries to debate the impact of emerging trends such as twitter as the advertising and publishing markets feel the strain of the recession.

Early bird tickets are available from £35 at  www.media140.com

“Being part of this is important as it is an opportunity for us to discuss what twitter and similar services will mean for industry going forward. Critical to that is that this event is independent and non profit allowing a neutral platform for discussion.”

“The twitter storm is with us and I had originally planned to run this event informally to raise money for Mencap as part of a charity run. As I started to talk to colleagues in the industry it started to grow organically and has shown how the industry is keen to debate these trends early and find ways to empower their businesses rather than shy away from them. ”

“Twitter is and will continue to be one of the central tools we use to locate, engage and collaborate with clients, the industry and subject matter experts.  From a news resource to a customer service platform, Twitter and similar services are set to continue there meteoric rise.  We are pleased to be a part of this important event.”

Solution partner brings local support to the UK market while providing more focused, regional guidance with social media monitoring, engagement strategy and tactics.

Radian6 has officially unveiled 6Consulting as an Authorised Solution Partner to provide local sales, support and training services to the UK market.

6Consulting have evolved from a leading Management Consultancy in Sales, Marketing and Customer Service transformation to well-regarded Social Media Monitoring and Engagement strategists.

Benefits to Radian6 customers in the UK:

•    6Consulting have in-depth knowledge of the UK market and a deep understanding of Radian6 and Social Media – and as such 6Consulting are able to provide more focused guidance in social media monitoring and engagement strategy and tactics

•    Local resources eliminates time zone difference between UK and North America, providing more efficient support to our customers

Co-Founder of 6Consulting Matthew Brazil said “We are delighted to be bringing the Radian6 platform to the UK market.  We currently work with a number of corporate, advertising, PR, brand and media clients – all of which have expressed interest and excitement supporting this partnership.”

6Consulting provide strategic guidance on the importance of social media monitoring, understanding that different organisations should be integrating different social techniques into overall business strategy.

CEO of Radian6 Marcel Lebrun said “The UK market is of great importance to us as a number of our Global partners have offices in the UK.  6Consulting are leading UK based Social Media Monitoring and Engagement Strategists that can not only support sales, support and training of the Radian6 platform but provide high level strategic consultancy to both Advertising/PR Agencies and Corporate clients.  We are thrilled to be working with them”

As a business 6Consulting have moved away from the traditional pick the telephone up and bash it sales model. Trust me, from an ‘X’ Sales Director this has been quite the leap for me. OK I instigated it and created the model, but convincing others it is a superior sales model has not always been easy.

Before people jump on me and say you can’t sell without picking the phone up and talking to people I must state that we DO talk to people on the phone, we just generate enough relevant inbound enquiries that we do not need to make cold calls.

The Social Media Sales Funnel is all about generating inbound communication, brand awareness, referrals and more. So how does the funnel work?

Before any sales funnel is created you need some activity, here is a breakdown of that activity:

1. Blogging
2. MicroMedia
3. Images
4. Video
5. Mainstream News
6. Forums
7. Our own websites
8. Channel / partnerships
9. Events and Speaking engagements

In a nutshell we perform activity in the above 9 areas and have a clear documented strategy for each. It is this activity that feeds the funnel. We do not purchase data, have teams of outbound sales reps or scripted sales activity. Rather we search, listen, learn, engage, co-create, knowledge share, network, post, tweet and more. It’s a new spin on selling, taking the old methodologies and updating them for a networked world. Its soft selling, not hard or cold selling, its meeting people at their point of need and being on every network, everywhere!

It’s Engagement Selling!

Like a traditional sales model we attribute activity targets within each of our 9 key areas, from this we can assign KPI’s, measure the activity and calculate an ROI on that activity. We don’t just measure ROI in terms of revenue, and this is an important aspect of Social Media Engagement Selling, we measure levels of engagement, awareness of our brand, revenue and more.

By adopting this model we are also able to offer leaner, smarter, quicker more responsive sales, support, training and consultancy. We can keep our overhead low as we don’t need masses of salespeople, technical staff or other. Our staff churn rate is virtually zero and we don’t need to spend thousands on marketing or pay per click campaigns. We engage with relevant people, offer help and advice, share knowledge and ultimately turn a bigger profit than if we had an older more traditional sales model.

The businesses of tomorrow will need to be lean, smart, responsive, engaged and relaxed about control of their brand. They will need to embrace the new channels customers and potential customers are demanding they participate in, so be smart, use this economic downturn as an opportunity to make your business better, not just for you, but for your audience as well.

Listen, Learn, Personalise, Engage, Communicate all words used at the Tory party conference. In fact everything I have seen so far not just in politics but business and life in general over the past few weeks/months is pointing towards the need to listen to conversations (I did think we were already doing this!).  If listening is important, understanding how, when, where and on what level to engage is equally as important.

It is no secret that I am an avid follower of politics and have a love/hate relationship with the political establishment.  Indeed not long before I started 6Consulting and throughout its first 12 months I seriously toyed with the idea of giving up business altogether and heading into politics but I still keep my hand in as the Vice Chairman of our area association having regular meetings with District, Local and Parish councilors, property developers and holding a number of public meetings.  For as long as I can remember I have fought for local people to have a voice in shaping their community and for open, honest, transparent dialog from councilors to the public they serve.  It has to be said it is this quest for openness and transparency that perhaps restricted me being appointed as a local parish councilor as the old, somewhat set in their ways hierarchy did not like my idea of being open!

So over the last month or so I have watched with morbid fascination the different political party conferences whilst working (gotta love technology!) from UKIP, Liberal, Labour and now Tory. My days have had a mix of nodding in agreement and shouting at the PC (well live stream actually) saying ‘Is it really that hard to listen?’, is it really that difficult to understand that we live in a different more connected world now.  Social media, the internet and all of the clever, exciting new platforms it has brought us are not a cure all for everything, but what they have given us is the ability to make our voices heard and connect with likeminded communities in a quest to discuss issues, ask questions and proffer advice.  Like I said ‘Online’ is not a cure all and I do have concerns that our youth can only speak in abbreviation and that technology has caused them to have an underdeveloped communication lobe.  However, conversations online have huge, monumental importance to each and every one of us. Conversations in the social sphere have:

1. Influenced my purchasing decisions
2. Accelerated my learning
3. Connected me with a smaller world
4. Recommended solutions
5. Made me money
6. Given me a platform to be heard
7. Amplified my voice.
8. Shaped my business.
9. And much much more

Do we really need to make the case for listening? Surely it is a standard business philosophy? Isn’t it where we get phrases such as ‘Voice of the customer’ and ‘The customer is always right’ from? Surely every business understands the need to listen why else would we have focus groups and market research? So we understand how to listen right? Or have we built a set of rules on listening? If you run a focus group it is on a small cross section, we take the figures and extrapolate them, we do the same with surveys.  We have these things called ‘Think tanks’ or as we like to say ‘Me tanks’ that guide decisions on everything from product packaging to the latest crazy political idea.  Businesses and politicians have become so used to listening to the few and making decisions for the many that the wisdom of crowds has been lost.

At the same time as focus groups and ‘Me Tanks’ started to run out of steam, importance or relevance so Social Media began its rise.  Businesses and Politicians now have an unprecedented never before seen opportunity to really listen, to gauge the mood, feelings and ideas of the crowd.  So it amazes me that people talk of listening but actually do it through ear muffs! Giving us lots of uh huh, ummm, like it, very interesting noises but then do nothing, nothing! with what they have learned.

So it would seem that we DO need to educate business and politics on the art of listening but most importantly once you have listened, dissected, analysed and graphalised (that’s a made up word!) that information you need to engage.  Yes, that’s right join the conversation.  I said join! Not control, manipulate or try to bury. So here are 5 things to get you started.

1. Listen – but listen to more than one person, stop extrapolating so much!
2. Learn – what is being said, why is it being said
3. Analyse – Do your dissecting, putting into boxes and graphalising here.
4. Participate – that’s right, get involved, have a conversation but please try not to control.
5. Co create – why not take a leaf out of lego’s book and co create with your community, it could be fun, save you a ton of cash / make you a ton of cash!

The above is not a complete list, it’s a snapshot, a fraction of the things you need to do, but please, at the very least begin the listening process.

I gave a speech at CaMedia last week on Conversations in the Social Sphere. I say speech it was more of an extended Q&A session where the audience participated rather than just spectated. We discussed what Social Media is, the numbers using it and why businesses should be listening and engaging.  A number of very interesting points were raised about listening namely that Social Media Monitoring can look a little like eaves dropping, snooping or bugging peoples conversations.  One comment was “what concerns me about social media monitoring is the concept of listening to peoples conversations, it’s a bit like sitting in a restaurant talking about Tesco’s and how messy or expensive the products are and turning round to see a Tesco employee with a clip board taking notes”.  I understand the fear people have about being spied on and the very mention of a political party using social media monitoring certainly worried the audience.  However, we all enter into conversations online clear in the knowledge that what we are doing is open, transparent and searchable by anyone.  Indeed the reason many of us engage in social media communities is to gauge opinions and thoughts of others.  We actually want our voices to be heard.  So rather than social media monitoring being big brotherish or Orwellian it is an application we the public should expect big business to have.  We want to use our megaphones and force businesses to meet us at OUR point of need, we are demanding a new channel in customer experience management. I am fed up with pressing 1 for sales, 2 for support and so on.  What I want to do is talk about it with my community and have a customer service rep contact me.

So, let’s see who is listening? I want everyone to reach out via whatever social platform you use, complain about products and services you are unhappy with and praise the ones doing a good job then see who answers the social phone.

I’ll start with BT.  You promised me a new Wireless Hub (the sleek black one 2.1 I think) and all you sent me was the hub phone.  Your customer service is so poor and it takes me on average 20 minutes to actually get through all of the press this or that nonsense that I am reaching out via my blog, please answer this social call.