Step 20 to Build a Better Business – Talk With Your Customers
We’ve spent more than a few steps discussing one-way communications from you to your customers; i.e., what you should be saying to your customers via your advertising, marketing, and branding. But how do you go about finding out what your customers have to say to you? In Step 19 to Building a Better Business, we focused on talking with your employees. In this step, we’ll focus on talking with your customers.
Surveys and Such
With your employees, it’s easier to find out what they have to say, because they’re usually in the same physical location as you are, or you can require them to be if needed. With customers, you have to go where they are. So you’ll need to make use of tools like surveys, questionnaires, and feedback forms. You can administer these tools in person, by phone, or over the Internet. SurveyMonkey is a free, web-based survey tool that you can use to create short surveys to be sent to your customers. You can use it survey your customers on their experience using your product or service, to poll them on what new features, products, or services they would like you to provide, to gather demographic information like income, # of children, marital status, etc. to enhance future advertising efforts. The list of information you can ask for is virtually endless.
Social Media
Another very effective tool or set of tools for two-way communications with your customers is social media. I almost hate to mention it, because there’s so much hype surrounding social media lately, and lots of businesses are poorly informed about it, so they’re polluting the landscape with an advertising-as-usual approach to social media. But there is an undeniable difference between advertising and effectively using social media, and those that ‘get it’, are seeing huge benefits. Here are some social media tools you may want to consider:
Blogs - an extension of your company’s website, blogs are a medium for you to write short or long ‘articles’ about company news, current projects, interesting anecdotes, other products you like and recommend, your company’s philosophies and any other topic that your customers may be interested in hearing you talk about. You can incorporate video and sound to provide a rich, multimedia experience, and comments allow your customers to reply to and give feedback on what you blog about.
Twitter – the little social media app that could. With Twitter you broadcast any short message, information, or question you may want to share with or ask your community of followers. In addition to interacting with customers, you can interact with other complementary businesses or individuals that share the same ideals and goals that you do.
LinkedIn - useful for networking with other professionals and business owners that may be interested in buying your products and services or working with you in some other way. You can also get referrals from past colleagues, clients, and employers – an excellent way to boost your business’ s credibility.
MySpace - especially useful for artists and musicians, as you can show samples of your art or offer tracks for preview and for purchase.
Facebook – another social media app for interacting with people you currently know or do business with, and the people they know or do business with.
The fact is, most people don’t buy products, they buy people or, you might say, they buy stories. This is even more the case with small business products and services, where customers are more apt to buy if they can connect in some way with the personality or story behind the business. With social media, you have a no- or low-cost vehicle to tell the true story of your business directly to your customer and to anyone else who may be listening. Think of social media as a way for you to engage in conversation about your business with your customer, much like you would with your friends and family. The more passionate you are about what your business does or produces, the better candidate you are to benefit from social media.
Photo by ronploof (Flickr)
Related Posts
- Step 14 to Build a Better Business – Prime the Pump for Leads
- Step 29 to Build a Better Business – Get Some Free Press
- Step 19 to Build a Better Business – Talk With Your Employees
- Step 22 to Build a Better Business – Do Some Community Service
Sage Small Business Solutions provides inexpensive infrastructure solutions for small and microbusinesses. If you're interested in improving your small business, or implementing techniques discussed in this article, find out how Sage can help.
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Hi there! I’m Kisha Solomon. I’m a writer, business advisor, and the owner of Sage Small Business Solutions.
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