Towards a consumer-oriented economy:
Why social media will change your business with or without you
Corporations vs. consumers
Corporations are built around consumers. And naturally, consumers expect brands to revolve around them. However, many brands have consistently avoided, or fought hard to minimize, any contact with consumers.
Consumer communications channels have always been limited. The few ways consumers could communicate with a brand were at the point-of-sale or though dedicated customer support phone lines.
For the past few decades, brands have been outsourcing their customer support to call centers. The message was simple: buy our product and then we'll ignore you until we need to sell something else.
With the arrival of the Internet, other technological consumer support channels have been opened in the form of email, chat support and forums.
Invariably, the Internet allowed consumers to organize around specific interests and niches, often in ways that were separate from the brand. In these cases, the brand cannot control or lead the conversation, but simply participate.
Here comes social media
Social media tools are products resulting from the basic human need to communicate, interact and play. We can safely say that given technological frameworks such as the Internet, humans will start to form communities based on similarities and interests.
For a brand, a social media presence on platforms like Facebook, Twitter and Foursquare is necessary. Why? Because everybody else is present: consumers, potential customers and competitors.
Suddenly, a customer-centric approach began to arise. Ten years ago, consumer support and engagement were seen as an expense to eliminate and outsource. Now, brands are struggling to internalize community creation and management and other social media practices. Brands want to talk to their customers and keep them engaged.
Having a strong brand community has become a great asset for any brand. A brand community allows the gathering of detailed business intelligence, effective new product launches and consumer acquisition and support.
Can your business adapt?
With or without you, social media and customer-centric business is inevitable. Your customer-centric approach can no longer be limited to your mission statement. The bipolar approach – ‘talk to us on Facebook but we'll ignore you on the phone’ – will only alienate your consumers and open a door for more consumer-centric competitors.
The strongest competitive advantage a brand can have is an engaged brand community – an army of evangelist consumers, whether satisfied or not. And if your business is scared of unsatisfied consumers, then your product is not good enough and misleading. Period. And still, unsatisfied consumers will help you improve and optimize your product and processes. You can no longer ignore this.
And that’s not all. A consumer-oriented business approach takes into account not only individual consumers, but also their environment. Social responsibility, authenticity and transparency are the glue that holds your brand community together.
Siloes will need to become more permeable, your communications will be more authentic, your products will improve, your brand community will grow, your business will gain and your stockholders will rejoice!
For once, it’s good to be good. Walking the talk has never been cooler.