Page 393 - Social Media Marketing for Dummies

Customer support

Marketing and customer support activities often happen within minutes of each
other on the social media brand pages (regardless of whether the brands want this
to be the case). A good example is that in any given moment on a brand page in
Facebook, one consumer may be expressing her love for the brand and talking
about fun brand-related activities while another may be complaining about a
defective product. In such a scenario, who manages what? There are no set rules,
and they vary by industry. Typically, the first line of response to a consumer is the
social media marketing team because that team serves as the voice of the brand on
the platform. If the situation demands a serious response very quickly or is an
issue that escalates suddenly, it’s handed off to customer support.

Although these divisions of labor are easy to write in a process document, the
truth is that when it comes to customer queries, the social media marketers and
the customer support professionals need to collaborate and partner very closely.
Each group brings different skills and experiences to the table, and who is posting
what largely doesn’t matter — the most important aspect is the collaboration
between the two groups. The same need for collaboration applies to marketing
and public relations, but a stronger governance model comes into play. The vol-
ume of messages in the consumer relations realm, versus more general marketing
conversations, drives how tight that collaboration needs to be.

Sales

If SMM were quite literally and narrowly about marketing, it wouldn’t be half as
interesting to companies as it is today. What makes it special is that within the
domain of SMM, you have facets of customer support, public relations, and sales,
too. As discussed earlier in the book, offering sales and discounts for customers
serves as a very strong incentive to Like a brand on Facebook or follow it on
Twitter.

Promoting the deals via the Facebook and Twitter pages of the brand usually makes
sense. In that case, the publishing should be managed by the same social media
coordinators in the marketing organization who are responsible for the page.

Another, more complex scenario is when the brand has e-commerce enabled on
its Facebook or Instagram page. In such a scenario, the page must be managed by
the e-commerce team or a digital team that may (or may not) sit in the marketing
department. But here, too, the management of the community and the social voice
of the brand should be driven through one team and one social media marketer, so
tight coordination is required.

CHAPTER 26 Understanding Social Media Governance 377