One of the most welcome developments in social media for consumers are the ubiquitous customer review websites. These sites, almost synonymous with Yelp, allow customers to communicate not just with an often-disinterested customer complaint department, but with the entire social web. Customers can post their experiences with customer service and satisfaction to the social web, for good or for ill, making it easier than ever to pick the right place for dry cleaning, auto repair and a host of other services.
That also means that one bad customer service experience can haunt you for years to come. Considering that besides posting on the popular social review sites your customers also tweet and share on Facebook, tracking negative comments about your business and encouraging a customer to amend their review after the issue has been addressed can be a full-time job.
In addition, according to this report, “for every consumer who gives feedback about a great experience, you probably have three to four others that feel the same way but didn’t tell you.” Meaning that an average business misses out on over 75% of positive reviews. How do you encourage your satisfied customers to say good things about you?
The new mobile channels offer a few easy ways for catching the bad before it becomes public, and encouraging your customers to publicize the good.
Catch the bad before it gets out into the public
A simple display with a QR code or a mobile opt-in taking the consumer to a mobile landing page and requesting them to fill out a short “tell us what you think” form in exchange for a discount on their next purchase can be a simple way to encourage engagement as well as repeat business.
This simple display can be placed in-store, where your customers can easily see it: on restaurant tables, on the door, at the cash register, inside a hotel lobby or a hotel room, etc.
A few customer service traditional mobile apps offer the “feedback” feature that allows the customer to voice their concern directly to the customer service department before the problem is big enough to warrant a nasty comment on Yelp or Foursquare. But traditional native mobile apps are costly, can take months to develop, come with the app store distribution hassle and require your customer to download the app to their phones. The above simple mobile landing page approach is a much lighter alternative, and with a proper content management system behind it allows you to control any changes 24/7.
Encourage consumers to publicize the good
A similar approach can be taken to encourage your happy customers to post positive reviews about your business on Yelp, Google places and other review sites. Offer a discount or a prize, and provide an easy way for them to reach your business listing at a targeted review site easily on their mobile.
