All of the businesses today are trying to more effectively communicate with their customers. These days, it is important for companies to have a large social media presence on sites such as Facebook and Twitter. Email marketing has become increasingly popular over the years as well.
Social media marketing
As the most popular social network among adults 18 – 29 years old, Facebook can be very powerful if used correctly. However, for most businesses with a local focus, contact center specialists at TSA Group suggest that they will need to use at least one other social media platform in addition to Facebook. This is because the majority of your current customers are not likely to have their entire friend network on Facebook- or if they are, they don’t check it regularly. Some examples of social networks where you can find potential customers who may be interested in your business include Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, and Snapchat.
Email newsletters
Email newsletters are a great tool to use to keep customers up-to-date with new product information, sales, coupons, recent blog posts, etc. With the easy accessibility of email inboxes on personal devices today, it’s easier than ever to quickly view any company update that might interest you. It also gives the customer the feeling that they’re receiving personalized updates which can be very powerful.
However, many companies make one common mistake when sending out their first few email newsletters: not having enough variety in content types. Doing this results in boring newsletter recipients who will either unsubscribe or gloss over your emails without realizing what useful information may be hidden within them. To combat this problem and keep your business’s name fresh in the minds of your customers, you should have a variety of content types in your next few newsletters. Here are some ideas on what to send:
- A new blog post that discusses customer feedback or reviews related to your business
- A link to an outside website with information relevant to the industry but not directly related to your business
- An entertaining video that is likely to go viral (if it does, the views will translate into more awareness for your company)
Did you know? Email marketing has an average ROI of $40 for every $1 spent.
Video marketing
If email newsletters are passive content, then video marketing is active content (it takes much more effort to actually watch a video than it does to read an email). With the average attention span decreasing by the day, video marketing’s popularity will only increase in the coming years. Not only can your company make its own videos for potential customers to view, but you can also join promotional partnerships with popular YouTube channels that might be related to your niche/target customer base. For example, if your business sells knives and accessories, you could partner up with Knife Depot, which has over 2 million subscribers.
Here are some examples of well-produced videos that companies have used effectively:
– A professional video that discusses product features and benefits, hosted by well-known company officials (or customers if the company is small enough)
– Videos demonstrating how to use your product in creative ways or tutorials on how to solve a common problem associated with your niche/product
– Themed videos showcasing all of your products in action at once. This would be especially effective for companies who sell multiple products under different categories, such as Clarks shoes, whose YouTube channel has over 300 videos.
Did you know? 9 out of 10 internet users watch online video content weekly.
Featuring customer reviews
If you’ve never heard about Yelp before, you’re likely missing out on some fantastic opportunities. Yelp is a site where customers can go to write reviews and sign up for newsletters related to their interests. This is very beneficial for brick-and-mortar businesses because people usually don’t leave Yelp reviews unless they were extremely satisfied or extremely dissatisfied with the company they worked with. To sweeten the deal, you could even offer your customers an incentive such as a $25 gift card in exchange for writing a review on Yelp (and refer to this guide by Social Media Examiner on how best to achieve that).
Keep your customer’s mind fresh about your business
All too often, we forget what it’s like to be a new customer, and our engagement with them quickly dies out. This is because we only think about the customers who are currently actively buying from us – those who have been business for years or even decades will not make repeat purchases unless you put in the effort up front. Your goal as an entrepreneur should be to keep your entire ‘addressable market’ aware of your brand, which means that you’ll want to send out newsletters, encourage reviews, run promotions through social media sites, and do anything else possible to stay relevant.
In today’s rapidly changing environment, companies must take advantage of all available customer communication methods in order to remain competitive. Customers want to be able to communicate with potential businesses quickly and easily. As a result, it is very important for businesses to not only create websites that are mobile-friendly but also robust enough to handle many different types of requests. Furthermore, engaging with customers through email newsletters, social media, and online communities helps build relationships with them which will increase trust levels as well as brand loyalty over time. All of this combined will lead to increased profitability for the business.
