We ask so much of our customers on social media. Click this. Like that. Share with your friends. Leave a comment. Write a review. Retweet. Enter now. It’s endless. And alongside that, we tell them HOW to do it. What to do. When and where. But the thing that we never really talk about is the WHY.
And to clarify, that’s why with a period, not why with a question mark.
Another way to think about WHY is to think about PURPOSE. When you explain the purpose of something – you’re introducing an idea for someone to believe in. If it’s compelling enough, then it leads them to want to be a part of something bigger than themselves. When people have a purpose, they have context. An origin point. Meaning.
And that’s something worth sharing. In fact, it’s word of mouth in action.
Here’s the thing about creating relationships with influencers – or with any customers for that matter: BOTH sides have to want the relationship. That’s just the way any healthy relationship works.
But we live in a day and age where the “professional influencers” are being chased by the love-sick brands like the middle-high school geek desperately wanting to be noticed by the most popular girl in the class (not that I know anything about that). No matter how much he dreams about it, plots about it, creates opportunities for it to happen or downright wants it, she has to want it too. Because one person wanting a relationship does not a relationship make.
And therein lies the rub with social. We see study after study that proves most people don’t want to have a deep, meaningful relationship with a brand. They want a discount. They want a freebie. They want. And they want more. It’s all take and no give. And then on this side, you have a mountain of brands pushing out marketing messages hoping to get a bite on a sale. Again, it’s all take and no give. Not exactly a healthy relationship, is it?
Now I don’t want to lead to you to believe that this is always the case. There are those loyal, passionate folks that DO want to have a deep, meaningful, long-lasting relationship with a brand. They want to learn all about them. To know their hopes and dreams. To know what ails them (and try and help fix it). And, of course, that will stand up for them no matter what. These are those rare advocates. And because they are rare, they need to be treated as such – but that’s another post for another time.
My point is this: let’s define the relationship first. There’s already so much clutter in the social media space now, do you really want to push out more of it to an audience who could are less? Look, DTR talks are hard. But the great thing is that at the end of it, you at least know where you stand, and the hard part is over.
Over cocktails with colleagues this week, we were talking about the usual – agency life, working with clients and oh, yeah, how the Internet has become one big pity party with a lot of whiners and complainers.
This is nothing new. In fact, the amount of noise that complainers make is getting louder and louder. To be clear, I know there are MANY legitimate things that we can complain about. But because we live in the age where anyone with an Internet connection “has a voice,” we’ve become used to reading our “friends” posts about delayed flights. Bad drivers. How their coffee is too hot. Even complaining about all the complaining (guilty). I’m sure the human behavior scientists are having a field day with all the data they’re collecting when it comes to wanting to be heard and ego and on and on. After all, studies show that the number one reason people post things on social media is for ego-driven purposes.
But no, this post isn’t going to be about how bad customer service stories get shared more than good ones. And it especially isn’t going to be about how to turn detractors into advocates.
Instead, I want to talk about telling your customers (or A customer) to go screw themselves. First of all, this is not a luxury all brands can afford. In fact, it’s one that very few can pull off. The example that comes to mind is the Alamo Drafthouse (from about a year ago). If you haven’t been or don’t know, the Alamo is a movie theater that serves you food and drinks during a show. They also have quirky film screenings with themes like quote-alongs, sing-alongs, shooting cap guns during action movies, etc. But what I REALLY love about the Alamo is how, before every movie, they explicitly warn you that if you talk or are on your phone during a movie, you get one warning and then you’ll be escorted out of the building (“we’ll kick your ass out” is how they so delicately put it). Because, as they say, they don’t mean to rude, but if you’re gonna be, then so will they.
If you’re not familiar with the story, an intoxicated young lady got kicked out of a movie for being loud. She called and left a message voicing her disgust that she couldn’t believe such a thing would happen. That they ripped her off. That this is America, for cryin’ out loud. But did the Alamo apologize and invite her to come back for a free movie? No. Instead, they made an example out of her and turned her voice mail into a commercial.
It went like this:
1) Brand has policy. 2) Brand highlights policy outlining rules and consequences when you break the rules. 3) Customer breaks rules. 4) Brand gives customer the finger.
Like I said, not all brands have this luxury. But because the Alamo stood up for what they believe in and pushed back on a whiny customer, it not only endeared its current customers to love them even more, but they won new awareness and probably customers because of it.
Holy moly, this makes me giggle like a little schoolgirl. We live in a world of contingency documents and crisis planning. We prepare for the worst-case scenario. We cringe at the stories of vigilante customers and fear the almighty social media influencers. Brands spend half their time trying to figure out how to engage with their customers and the other half preparing for the backlash of engaging with their customers.
Again, allow me to reiterate. AT&T can’t do this. Ford can’t do this. American Airlines can’t do this. But when it comes to niche brands with deeply loyal followings, there’s an opening. No, you shouldn’t be looking for opportunities on how you can tell your customers to go fly a kite. But if you have a set of simple, ironclad rules that come with your brand and someone breaks them, then a whole new set of opportunities opens up.UPDATE: Since penning this post yesterday, I was reminded of this tried and true story about Southwest Airlines from the book “Nuts.”
Jim Ruppel, director of customer relations, and Sherry Phelps, director of corporate employment, tell the story of a woman who frequently flew on Southwest, but was disappointed with every aspect of the company’s operation. In fact, she became known as the “Pen Pal” because after every flight she wrote in with a complaint. She didn’t like the fact that the company didn’t assign seats; she didn’t like the absence of a first-class section; she didn’t like not having a meal in flight; she didn’t like Southwest’s boarding procedure; she didn’t like the flight attendants’ sporty uniforms and the casual atmosphere. And she hated peanuts! Her last letter, reciting a litany of complaints, momentarily stumped Southwest’s customer relations people. Phelps explains: “Southwest prides itself on answering every letter that comes to the company and several employees tried to respond to this customer, patiently explaining why we do things the way we do them. [Our response] was quickly becoming a [large] volume until they bumped it up to Herb’s desk, with a note: ‘This one’s yours.’ In sixty seconds, Kelleher wrote back and said, ‘Dear Mrs. Crabapple, We will miss you. Love, Herb.’
Personally, I love hearing stories of brands fighting back. When it’s done “on brand” and is legitimate, it can go a long way. And who knows? Maybe one-day things will even out and the cry-babies will think twice before they post that negative comment about the tiniest thing.
Any social media kid out there worth their salt will tell you that “likes don’t matter.” I even wrote a post over a year ago to explore “Life Beyond the Like.” We all throw hissy fits every time the number of Facebook likes is used as a measure of success in a case study and rail against the c-suite when they tell us that they want to reach a certain number of likes for this campaign.
But at the risk of having the social media kids come out of the woodwork, let me tell you something: Likes matter.
Back off a second and allow me to explain, will ya? You can’t tell me that you haven’t looked at a client’s or potential client’s or even a competitor’s Facebook page and said to yourself, “Hmmmm, they only have XX likes? That sucks.” You can’t tell me that the Chevy Camaro people don’t want more likes than the Ford Mustang people. Or that AT&T wants more likes than Verizon. Or that at least one metric of that project you did for your client isn’t the number of “likes” you garnered.
Let’s face it: People “like” your page if you have led them there because of a promotion. Or because they’ve been a loyal, lifetime customer. Or simply because you’re a beloved brand. Or because you’re “cool” and people want to be associated with you. Just like the people who have huge numbers of followers on Twitter tell you that the number of followers don’t matter, the same goes for Facebook. But it’s a lie. They do matter. Because it’s a measurement of visits and eyeballs. Yes, research shows that on average, only 1% of people who “like” a page interact with that brand on a regular basis on FB. I hear you. I feel your disappointment.
Instead, let’s start thinking about the “like” as either the beginning of a journey for some, or a point in time of a journey for others. What comes before? What comes after? How does that online action lead to offline word of mouth? There are many other variables, but a “like” is one of them.
In other words, “likes” matter. But so do a lot of other things in the mix. So before you go off on another rant about 1% engagement rates and the ROI of someone clicking that “like” button, think about how “likes” are table stakes now. They are expected. They are a part of what not only we are judged on, but what our client is judged on as well. Let me reiterate: it’s not the ONLY thing, or even a really IMPORTANT thing, but it’s a thing. So deal with it.
There are many things that fascinate me about the communications space right now. Human behavior and social tools. The staying-power of great advertising. Yeah, there’s a list. And another line on there is the gap between the digital/social media kids and the “traditional” side of the house.
How many times have you heard the digital kids in your agency whine and moan about how the traditional PR/communications people “just don’t get” social. That they think it’s some plug-in tactics after everything is figured out. How the program would be so much better if social media had a seat at the table from the beginning. You know, when everything’s integrated.
But what I’ve found is that as much as that may be true, many of the social kids don’t really understand what “traditional” PR/communications people do. Like, at all. You’re probably nodding your head right now because you know it’s true. It’s not all press releases and pitching stories. It’s actually a WHOLE lot more than that. Just ask them.
So to be the Word of Mouth guy of the group has made me realize that WOM is the answer to bridging that gap between social and traditional. When my team and I talk about a word of mouth program or concept with the social kids, their eyes light up, because they can easily see the digital hooks. And when we have that same conversation with the traditional folks, they easily get it too, because it’s a natural extension of what they are already doing. (Yes, ideally everyone would be in the same room when that conversation happens, but one thing at a time.)
I’m not saying that WOM is always the magic bullet. But I AM saying that it can be the bridge. The word of mouth discipline has its feet firmly planted in both the online and offline worlds (this is the part where I remind you that 90% of word of mouth conversations still happen offline). Because, built the right way, WOM programs that engage people in remarkable experiences push people online. And the reverse is also true. It’s actually a cycle: online to offline and offline to online.
So when you’re starting to work on that new project or even when the word “integrated” comes up, remember that word of mouth can help bridge the gap between two worlds. It just may be the difference between just another campaign that falls flat and a powerful, successful engagement.
We ask so much of our customers on social media. Click this. Like that. Share with your friends. Leave a comment. Write a review. Retweet. Enter now. It’s endless. And alongside that, we tell them HOW to do it. What to do. When and where. But the thing that we never really talk about is the WHY.
