Your company’s social media is the first place customers go to vent if something goes wrong. At PeakActivity, we make it the first place they go to celebrate.
We help partners put reputation management systems in place to meet and exceed customer expectations, increasing brand loyalty, favorability, and long-term profitability. The questions we help answer are familiar to all of us: How do we respond to customer questions? How are issues escalated? If a complaint comes in, where does it go? But their answers have a profound impact on customer and employee satisfaction.
Case Study: Eyewear Brand
Eyewear Brand, had a dismal reputation with consumers, largely due to their slow response to customer feedback. Their rap sheet included everything from 0-star reviews to complaints filed with the Better Business Bureau.
Upon partnership, our PeakActivity Account Manager became the brand’s first touch for customer service and audience engagement on social media. Through social listening and proactive outreach, we improved the response rate from weeks to hours and decreased customer complaints by 15%.
Case Study: Women’s Intimates Brand
Women’s Intimates Brand is another PeakActivity partner that struggled to manage its reputation with customers. Their products were limited to women with bust sizes from B to D. However, the brand targeted women of all sizes, which mistakenly led customers to believe that all sizes were available. The result? Customer feedback layered with annoyance and confusion.
We took a holistic approach to help our partner better serve their customers. Strategies included social listening, re-aligning the audience base, adjusting brand messages, and generally improving customer interactions.
Women’s Intimates Brand soon began to identify specific products that were problematic for customers (and the brand’s reputation). Then, they were able to meet customer needs individually, while addressing the larger issue at hand (the products) by discontinuing certain items.
With their new approach to reputation management, Women’s Intimates Brand saw a significant decrease in complaints and a substantial increase in customer satisfaction. As a result of PeakActivity’s strategic delivery, the brand’s Return on Advertising Spend increased by 73%.
Reputation Management Strategies
As our case studies show, there’s no magic bullet when it comes to navigating brand reputation on social media. That’s why we recommend a holistic approach that includes social listening, proactive outreach, fast, reactive responses, and clear operating procedures to quickly escalate and resolve customer complaints.
Social Listening
Social Listening is how brands monitor their online presence. Our social monitoring practice typically looks at:
- Brand Mentions
- Conversion Rates
- Engagement Levels
- Hashtag Usage
- Industry Trends
We also investigate Social Sentiment, meaning the attitude of consumers toward a brand. Customers expect brands to respond quickly across channels. By listening actively and responding with speed, brands can steer conversations with customers to cultivate loyalty and positive sentiment.
Proactive Outreach
Proactive Outreach requires understanding a brand’s audience (who they are and who they could be), the competitive climate, and interacting with customers in real-time. Methods include social listening, competitive analyses, and geo-location targeting.
Reactive Communication
Reactive Communication offers less desirable results than Proactive Outreach but is still an important part of managing digital reputation. Simply put, Reactive Communication means responding to customer needs swiftly and resolving customer service issues before they get out of hand. Many brands fall into the trap of focusing on how they can address negativity, but we urge partners to use these engagements as opportunities for positive messaging.
PeakActivity tip: for the best results with Reactive Communication, be sure to listen, research, analyze, and learn from the interaction.
Customer Interactions: A Quick How-To
Response Time
Customers expect immediate attention. Plain and simple. Why do so many customers prefer to message a brand’s Instagram account? Because they associate it with insta-communication. Therefore, in order to address customer needs and stay competitive, responses need to be instant. (See Eyewear Brand Case Study)
Quality
When it comes to customer interactions, quality matters. People want authentic and considerate responses, even if it’s something as simple as providing store hours. Quality interactions with customers can improve brand reputation, enhance brand awareness, and even boost sales.
Consistency
Keeping up with response times requires consistent effort. Using both proactive and reactive strategies can help a brand achieve a reputation for reliability while also strengthening individual connections with consumers and cultivating brand loyalty.
Systems
With consideration of company structure and key players, different systems will work better for different businesses. Therefore, it’s important to adopt a system (or set of systems) that provide clear guidelines for reputation management.
Systems can help establish protocols for:
- Ad Management
- Influencer Partnerships
- Proactive Engagement
- Quality Assurance
Case Study: Personal Protective Equipment Brand
Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) Brand struggled with customer service across their social media platforms. The challenge? They lacked the clear communication systems needed to accelerate response times.
We delivered a tailored solution, creating and implementing Standard Operating Procedures, and creating a funnel to triage interventions. By engaging with PPE Brand’s audience through proactive outreach and by responding quickly to customer inquiries, PeakActivity produced rapid improvements in social reputation and a dramatic increase in followers and engagement.
Who Manages a Brand’s Reputation?
Reputation Management blends customer service, social media management, human resources, and sales. That’s why there’s rarely one specific person whose job is dedicated to addressing this important aspect of a brand. Some companies use reputation management systems, which scan channels for brand mentions and then disseminate automated replies. Still, while we agree that automation can do a lot for a business, we also know that social listening requires real people.
At PeakActivity, Reputation Management is driven by a team of motivated business partners who are social-savvy and customer-oriented. We work together to leverage what works, pivot when necessary, and innovate at every opportunity. That’s how we make a difference in digital.