Do Business, Socially

Are you still asking the question, 'what is social media?' A concise and on-point answer, courtesy of Wikipedia:

Social media is information content created by people using highly accessible and scalable publishing technologies. At its most basic sense, social media is a shift in how people discover, read and share news, information and content. It’s a fusion of sociology and technology, transforming monologue (one to many) into dialog (many to many) and is the democratization of information, transforming people from content readers into publishers.

We're social beings by nature, you can translate that innate ability into the way you're doing business. Be part of the discovery and dialog.

Google+ - Changing Small Business

A short, but effective explanation of the benefits of Google+ for small business by Chris Brogan. Thanks to Social Media Examiner for dropping this clip in my inbox this AM.

May I put you on hold?

"Wait. What? You're putting me on hold for a third time so you can connect me with your shift leader's supervisor's manager? I just needed to know one simple thing about my account..."

Sound familiar? All too familiar. Too often customers pick up the phone to find an answer to a question and don't receive a hint of customer service from the other end of the line. Customers start with the pretense that the entity they patron cares about them and is in the business of customer service. So why are some companies destroying that expectation for their customers? The short answer is that customer service has fallen off the corporate radar as a priority training item and expectation of employees.

The solution? It starts during the interviewing and hiring process - finding the right people with depth of character and a sense of empathy. Employees can be trained in technical skills, but personality is inherent. To paraphrase author Jim Collins from his book Good to Great, get the right people on the bus and get the wrong ones off.

Front-line employees, the ones answering the phones and interfacing with customers, often are the first glimpse customers have of your business. That representation is key. If apathetic, disinterested and under invested representatives are answering your phones, manning your cash registers, or responding on social media - you're in for a wake-up call. Your customers won't carry on a long-standing relationship with you. They'll move on and find a company that does care about them.

Don't delay, aggravate or negate your customers and their needs (no matter how small that need may be.) Customer service ties into personality and desire - hire the people that want to help your business and your customers be successful and valued.

Don't Just Collect a Network, Build One.

'Go out of your way for people and build a network of real relationships,' says [paraphrased] marketing mastermind, Seth Godin.

Why blog?