Why Social media is important for online retailers

A presentation on social media for business from Fi Bendall was another stand-out presentation at Online Retailer, and not just because of the startling claims in the short video she showed.
Would you believe that one in eight of all marriages in the US today are between people who met online? Or that 16% of all the people visiting the Sportsgirl web-site were on Facebook immediately before?
If not, you’d better get with the program, as they say. For Bendall’s presentation proved beyond doubt that online, the old truism that the opinions of our friends and family are really big influences remains as true as ever.
We rely on what on our friends and family say. So although other influences on what we buy, where we go, and how we behave are also significant, its our friends and family that are the most important.
And that’s why social media is so relevant to business. It’s the online equivalent of word of mouth, said Bendall.
With her consulting business, Bendall has now done a number of assignments for major corporations, and developed a very clear set of messages. One of the first of these is that “Social media and search go very well together”.
“Spending on social media will lift your search ranking” she said.
Businesses investing in search engine optimization should also consider investing in what might well be called social media optimization, she said.
However far from doing that, many businesses are actively discouraging their employees from participating in social media, she said. Indeed they’re banning employees from accessing social media sites through the office computer network.
“Sites like Twitter can be very useful to a business, even if only as a listening post” she said.
You can see what people are saying about you in a way that is much more real and authentic than formal survey’s.
And although she warned that some businesses might be disturbed with what they hear about themselves in social networks, she urged caution about being defensaive and jumping straight in to counter any adverse comments.
“Two ears, one mouth” was her constant mantra. Or in other words spend more time online listening than speaking.
She recommended that once your business has identified the online sites where it is being discussed and or mentioned, the next step is to plan and be tactical about how you engage.
“You should identify your online advocates and your online lovers as well as your online haters.”
She said that often times, one of your online advocates will response to online criticism. So it isn’t necessary to jump in and directly defend yourself. Having an independent person doing that online will carry much more weight, she counselled.
Bendall also suggested using sites like Twitter as a vehicle for customer service. Setting up a Twitter hashtag (i.e. #yourcompany) will enable any tweet mentioning your company to be monitored, so you can respond immediately with at least an acknowledgement to anyone who has an issue, she explained.
By the end of Bendall’s presentation her closing message was hard to deny so convincing had been her arguments.
“It isn’t about your web-site anymore. Its about how your content is distributed and perceived around the Internet.”
For more information go to:
www.bendalls.com.au