Transcript: Lesson Five

Using Social Media to Build One-to-One Relationships

Video 1: Why Engagement is the Heart of Your Social Strategy

Hi, it’s Crystal King from HubSpot Academy. The world of social media has changed quite a bit in
recent years. It used to be that if you published a message on a social channel your audience
would see it. But now, with so many users and so many posts, plus network algorithms that don’t
favor brands, it’s more difficult than ever to use social media as a channel just to share content.
Clicks are no longer easy to acquire.

Christina Garnett, Social Strategist, ICUC

“Networking and engagement matters because any time you have a conversation with someone,
whether it's online or in person, there needs to be this give and take. Have you ever been on a first
date where that other person just talked about themselves the entire time, didn't care about you,
didn't want to talk about you at all? You never want to see that person again. It's the same thing with
brands. If a brand is just talking at you and you try to talk back to them and they don't engage, they
don't like, they don't comment, that's a problem and it also means that those people are going to
stop engaging with you. Those likes are going to stop. Those comments are going to stop because
they realize that you don't care and you don't see it.”

This means that it’s time to shift focus and start looking at social media as what it’s best used for —
building meaningful one-to-one relationships. It’s quite simple, really. Listen to and engage with
your customers and prospects directly. People want to talk to people, not brands. They want to
engage directly with individuals, and the world of social media is the best place to do just that.

The good news is that this type of engagement is often the most rewarding. Individuals who
engage with you on social are likely to trust you more, have deeper loyalty, and be more likely to
recommend your products and services to others.

Bruno Cardinali, Head of Marketing North America at Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen

“So the way we see it at Popeye's is that customer service and fan engagement, it's pretty different.
So customer service, we're always trying to answer any specific questions or any specific demands
that the customers are putting on social media that they require an immediate answer and
immediate attention. So the way we handle those inquiries is really different in the way that we
handle fan engagement. Fan engagement, it's always more lighthearted. It's always more fun, and
it's always more proactive from our side. While the customer service, it tends to be always more
reactive to how guests are putting their requests or their needs or their experiences on social
media.”

Engaging directly with your audience is the heart of your social media strategy. It’s the feel good,
let me take care of you, let’s work together strategy.
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Using Social Media to Build One-to-One Relationships

Video 2: How to Get Started With One-to-One Engagement

Too many individuals and businesses are using social media as a push channel. What do I mean by
that? It means that rather than developing engaging content and talking directly with an audience,
content is pushed out, often automatically, to social media without a thought for the person who
may be reading it. Or, more importantly, without ALSO engaging the audience directly, in addition
to one’s content strategy.B2B companies are especially guilty of this — but they don’t have to be.

Nicole Votolato Montgomery, Associate Professor of Marketing at the McIntire School of

Commerce, University of Virginia
“The number one thing that brands are doing wrong on social media is trying to push product. In
contrast to traditional media, social media is more about developing relationships and trying to
identify how you as a brand can add value to your customers.”

Pushing out relevant content can be beneficial to you and your audience. But if it’s done in a
vacuum, you’ll be missing out on what makes social media truly special and successful.

So, let’s talk about the benefits of talking more directly with your social followers and prospects.

First, you can build and grow your brand by having direct contact with your audience. It shows
you care, that you are interested in them. It gives your brand a human element, and remember
what I said before about how people want to interact with people, not brands?

Second, you can improve your reputation, especially if you are engaging with unhappy
individuals. Show that you are listening, show that you care and that you actively want to improve
their situation and make things right.

Third, you can answer questions that many of your prospects and customers might have. By
responding to questions, other people with the same question may find the answer without having
to reach out to customer service.

Fourth, one-to-one engagement helps you provide additional value to your audience. You can
give tips and tricks to individuals directly, you can give advice, or you can share fun facts that your
audience might not be expecting.

Fifth, you can amplify your reach. I know, that sounds funny when we are talking about one-to-
one engagement, right? But those direct interactions have a cascading effect, particularly when it
comes to word-of-mouth. Excited and engaged customers may engage more often, share your
material, and, most importantly, tell others of their positive experience. This is especially true if you
turn a negative to a positive for a customer.
 Transcript: Lesson Five
Using Social Media to Build One-to-One Relationships

That brings us to the sixth benefit. You can increase customer loyalty. I just mentioned how
powerful turning a negative experience into a positive was, and in fact, according to Statista, 47%
of US consumers have a more favorable view of brands who respond to customer service
questions or complaints on social media. The converse is true as well. Sprout Social found that
about 50% of consumers stated they would boycott a brand due to a poor response on social.
Additionally, 41% of consumers will share bad experiences with a brand with their network.

So now the big question I’m sure you are asking is, “How on earth do I get started?”

By diving in.

Here are some things that you can do to foster more general social engagement:

● Respond to comments, even if it’s just with a like or a smiley face. But,

● Be honest, transparent, and personal. Have a personality and be truthful in your dealings
with customers and prospects.

● Be funny. Use humor thoughtfully. For example, an upset customer may not appreciate a
joke, but for the most part, humor makes a brands seem more real, more in touch. JetBlue is
known for their helpful customer service. In addition to providing help, their exchanges with
their customers show their personality and their love for what they do.

● Offer additional value. Consider how you can surprise commenters with a coupon code or
access to supplemental material. When someone is rewarded for their engagement, they
are more likely to continue engaging. In this example, someone mentioned on the
discussion website Reddit that they were reading my book and my offering them the free
companion cookbook resulted in a sale from someone else who saw my comment.

● Ask for reviews. If you’ve helped someone, ask them to do you a favor and give you a
review. When people are happy about the work you do they sometimes just need to be told
how to share that love.

● Ask for product commentary. If you are implementing a new site feature, see what the
audience thinks before you move forward. Or how you can tweak it after it goes live.
 Transcript: Lesson Five
Using Social Media to Build One-to-One Relationships

● Conduct polls. This is an easy way to show the audience you are listening and that you care
about their opinions. The key here is to follow up and demonstrate the outcome. Share the
results, deliver on their opinion. For example, when I worked at Keurig several years ago, we
asked people if they were interested in having the company make a green or a blue coffee
brewer. We let the audience decide and ultimately made the green brewer. Fans were
delighted.

● Respond to comments in real time. This is a great tactic for any company, but especially
for B2B companies with products that may be more complex. Invite special guests, conduct
live demonstrations, host your own live shows on a specific topic. Have someone feed you
questions coming in from comments and address them in your live show.

● Tag guests so they can help extend your reach. If you have a guest blogger on your site,
or your podcast, or videos, tag them in the content so they can help share it. Thank them for
their participation.

● Reference the amazing content of others. If you are a team of one or just a few people,
this is something really easy you can do to drive engagement and interest from other
influencers, to build relationships and to extend your reach.

● Encourage readers to comment, like, and share. This is a simple ask, but it can be very
powerful. According to Buffer, your tweets have a 12x higher chance of being retweeted if
you ask for it and 23x higher if you actually spell out the word “retweet.” Use this tactic
sparingly so as not to seem too self-serving.

● Consider starting a Facebook or LinkedIn group. What a great way to really engage with
your followers! You’ll need to be able to dedicate the time to moderating and participating
in these groups, but the power of doing so is so worth it. Online magazine The Cook’s Cook
was looking for a way to reach more individuals and started a Facebook group. Their main
page, as of this recording, has 8,356 followers, but their Facebook group has over 89,000
members! Sounds like a great reason to consider a group, right? Facebook also gives
brands the option of creating groups that require a subscription which gives the option of
offering exclusive content for fans.

● Ask a question and respond to the answers. This seems so simple, but few companies
take advantage of this easy way to drive engagement.
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Using Social Media to Build One-to-One Relationships

● And finally, use emojis. It’s a fantastic way to put a personal face on your brand content.
And it works! For example, social analytics firm Quintly, found that the use of Emojis Can
Lead to 47.7% More Interactions on Instagram. Check out this Valentine’s Day example from
Major League Baseball (MLB).

Even just adding a few of these tactics into your everyday strategy will help make a big difference.
You’ll have better connections with your audience, greater reach and improved brand awareness
and loyalty!

Video 3: What is Social Customer Service, and Should You Be Doing It?

Social customer service, sometimes referred to as social care, is one of the newest and most
effective modes of marketing. I can hear you wondering, “Customer service is marketing?” In the
social space, it definitely is. That’s because the interactions are public, and how you do customer
care in the social space says volumes about your brand.

Marketer Jay Baer said it all when he said: "When customer service becomes public, it becomes a
spectator sport. If you are really good at public customer service, then your social care can become
a new form of marketing."

Let’s discuss the benefits. Social care helps you:

○ Drive brand awareness.

○ Sell more products and services.
○ Humanize your brand.
○ Build loyalty.
○ Drive revenue growth.

That last point is important. According to McKinsey, “companies that developed social care
capabilities improved year-over-year revenue per contact by 6.7 percent through effective
upselling, cross-selling and customer churn reduction versus a 12.1 percent decline for those
without that capability.”

That financial gain can come in a variety of ways. It could be increased sales. It could be less
returns as individuals self-service based on information from social media. Or it could be saving
money. According to Incite, a social media interaction costs 1 dollar compared to 6 dollars for a
call center interaction.
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Using Social Media to Build One-to-One Relationships

Another reason why you should be considering customer care on your social channels is that your
customers are expecting it. According to HubSpot’s research, 90% of customers rate an
"immediate" response as important or very important when they have a customer service question.
60% of customers define an "immediate" social response as 10 minutes or less. And HubSpot has
found that 72% of Twitter complainants expect a response within an hour.

So how do you start doing more social customer care? There are a few things you can do.

First, you don’t have to be everywhere, but you should be on the channels where your
customers are. If you have a young audience, they are more likely to be using Snapchat or Twitter.
Parents may be more inclined to use Facebook or Pinterest. Business customers are likely using
LinkedIn. Find the channels where most of your customers are and start there.
Then, invest in a social monitoring tool. See what customers are saying and next,

Respond to comments. In an ideal world you should make an effort to respond to most people —
good and bad — who aren’t spamming you. This may be difficult to do if you are a small team, so
be thoughtful if you are picking only some to respond to — those who you leave out may feel
slighted. However, sometimes responding to everyone isn’t always needed. Let’s hear from one of
our experts:

Samarah Daher, VP Media Operations at Refinery29

“So, in any social platform, you're going to have trolls. It's just the nature of the game. Most trolls
really do want that attention, so we try not to give it to them. If someone's posting something that
feels a little troll-y, but it's just that they're misinformed, we'll take it as an opportunity to educate
them, but if they're saying something that's just hateful or mean, we'll ignore them, and if it
continues, then most likely we will block them because we are very focused on creating a positive
environment for our community. My favorite part is when our audience handles the trolls for us. We
have a very active audience, and so if someone says something that maybe is not 100% nice, I love
it when our audience goes in and basically corrects them. Ideally, it works better than if I was
replying to them.”

You should also have an SLA, or service-level agreement. This is a commitment by the company
to handle social media inquiries in a certain amount of time. This may differ by company. Some
brands resolve to respond to customers within minutes, others within two hours. An SLA will help
you set expectations with your customers and help your company measure results.

Christina Garnett, Social Strategist, ICUC

“An SLA is a Service Level Agreement and it's crucial because it sets a precedent for how the client
and how the agency or how that market or whoever's working for them is working. For social
monitoring it matters because it sets a guideline as to how quickly are we going to be reacting to
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Using Social Media to Build One-to-One Relationships

this content. So, are we at an hour SLA, which means I need to respond to those comments within
an hour? 24 hours? A week, a day? It sets expectations. So, there's a clear understanding between
those two parties, how they're going to work together, and there's also an understanding of what
that means for the brand. There are certain brands who don't need an hour SLA because the
complaints or the positive comments that they're receiving, they aren't dire. They aren't crucial. If
you're an airline and someone's mad because they canceled their flight and they're going to miss
their next flight, that's pretty dire. You're going to want a very short window for your SLA. Now, if
someone doesn't like their burger and they just want to be able to get a refund, that can wait more
and more time. That can be a few hours. That can take time and it's also important to know what you
need to respond to first. There's nothing wrong with having priorities, especially when it comes to
escalating comments. If someone gets food poisoning from your food from your restaurant, that's
significantly more dire than someone who just had a rude waitress. Being able to know what needs
to be acted on first is perfectly normal in an SLA.

Along with this, you should create community guidelines or “house rules.” Tell your community
how you will interact and keep civility within your channels. When do you delete Facebook
messages? Do you allow vulgarity on your Facebook wall? Do you block trolls on Twitter? Be up
front and clear.

Consider creating a dedicated handle for customer service to help keep your customer care and
marketing messages separate. For example, @HubSpotSupport @ComcastCares and
@AppleSupport are all dedicated to helping customers.

Go beyond just responding and seek out engagement. Use a social listening tool and look for
unhappy customers who are not posting to your channels, and offer to help. This is a measure of
goodwill that may be unexpected and the rewards are enhanced loyalty and word-of-mouth. Look
for positive interactions, too, and consider thanking them or resharing their content.

Be authentic and human in your responses. When you use overly official language, you lose the
real personality that your audience in social media craves. But be true to the tone of your brand
voice. If you are a government agency, you may have a need to be more straightforward than a
company that is selling some hip new beverage to millenials. Also, don't be defensive in your
responses. Take the high road and treat the customer as generally right even if they aren’t. Your
kindness and respect in the face of opposition will say volumes to others watching.

Commit a human resource to response. Hire an agency if needed. If your company is serious
about taking care of customers in social media — and the traffic warrants it — dedicating a person
on the team to responding to social questions within a specific time period is key. There are a
number of agencies that help with moderation, including some that you see on this . Along with
this, you may want to consider connecting your social customer care to an in-house customer care
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Using Social Media to Build One-to-One Relationships

team or a call-center customer care team. Many companies do what they can to triage situations in
the social space but then help to transfer more complex problems to a specialized customer care
group.

To help you streamline your customer care activity, develop an FAQ (frequently asked questions)
document to use when responding. This is especially important if you get the same questions over
and over. But the trick here is that you can’t cut and paste _ not exactly. You need to tailor each
message just a bit to show that there is a real person behind the scenes. Include the name or
handle of the person if you can. You can also create videos to demonstrate more complex
problems or to help educate on certain topics.

Consider if using a chatbot can help. Chatbots are automated programs designed to interact
with humans conversationally on websites or messaging apps. Sometimes bots can be useful in
answering basic questions or to point customers to a database of support knowledge. But be
careful as bots can seem impersonal especially if a customer is frustrated and really wants to
interact with a real person.

That leads me to my next point: determine when to take an issue offline. If someone is unhappy
and you can’t easily solve their frustration in a short response, ask them to direct message you their
information so you can better help them. This removes their frustration from the public eye and it
also shows the public that you are interested in helping your customers.

One good thing to keep in mind is that you shouldn’t engage with a customer whose intent is
to simply argue and publicly defame your brand. Sometimes your best defense is silence and,
after a certain point, they'll damage their own credibility more than your brand's reputation.

Karen Freberg, Associate Professor in Strategic Communications at the University of

Louisville.
“There's going to be some people that will never like what you're doing on social. They have an
agenda right there to basically feel that they have ownership of being negative to you, and you have
to acknowledge that. But really spend the time that you can to focus on those who are supportive,
that are engaging, and that really want the best for the community and for the brand involved.”

Also, it’s a good policy to not delete (or hide) comments or posts unless they go against your
clearly stated guidelines. Doing so may make your company appear deceptive and dishonest.

Finally, consider creating a crisis response plan to provide a framework for social response.
Make sure to define your company’s communication network to be used in an emergency or crisis,
be it physical such as a natural event, or online such as a social media faux pas that paints your
company in a bad light.
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Using Social Media to Build One-to-One Relationships

Understanding how to interact with your audience in public social channels and behind the scenes
can help build loyalty and affinity with your customers, while at the same time attracting new
prospects.

Video 4: How to Hit Your Business Goals With Social Selling

Let’s talk about social selling. First off, what is it?

Social selling is when salespeople use social media to interact directly with their prospects.

There are a few different ways to engage in social selling, but if you want to really embody the
inbound way of doing business, then your salespeople will provide value by answering prospect’s
questions and offering thoughtful content until the prospect is ready to buy.

There are a lot of reasons to consider why social media is a perfect place for your sales team to
engage. A few years ago, research firm Sirius Decisions found that 67% of the buyer’s journey is
digital. What that essentially means is that individuals are no longer going into stores and browsing
or picking up the phone to reach a sales rep to make a decision. Instead they are looking at online
reviews, reading forum commentary, watching videos made by the company and by customers,
and asking the internet about your products and services. This happens long before they will reach
out to the company.As a salesperson, your goal is to reach them in this research phase to help
influence the purchase decision early on.

Additionally, LinkedIn says that 78% of social sellers outsell in comparison to colleagues who don’t
use social media.Plus, IDG tells us that 84% of C-level and VP-level buyers are influenced by social
media when purchasing.

Sounds like a good reason for your sales team to become socially savvy, right?

Here’s how to get started:

First off, consider your buyer persona. This helps you to be more targeted in your approach. If
you are selling swimming pools, for example, you aren’t going to care about people living in urban
high rises. You want to reach homeowners, potentially with kids, and with a certain financial
demographic. Narrowing down who your buyer is helps you become very focused in your
outreach strategy.

Then, use social listening to identify your audience. It will help you determine which platform they
are on, how they use the channel and what topics that they are talking about.
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Using Social Media to Build One-to-One Relationships

Brayton Ducharme, Senior Account Executive, Crayon

“Social monitoring certainly makes a difference when it comes to social selling, especially for sales
people who want to seem more informed about a buyer's needs or their industry. For example, by
understanding articles or trends in that market, you could use that to send over to a prospect, to
appear more informed about what is important to them. Similarly, you can monitor forums on
LinkedIn or organic conversations, in which somebody may be asking their peers about which sales
enablement platform may be best for them or how to implement it. That's your opportunity to then
serendipitously reach out to them with your ideas on what sales enablement platform might work
for them. And typically in those forums too, their information... Their first and last name, the
company that they work for is right there, so you can either use other platforms to put those pieces
together and find their email address, or even reach out to them right on LinkedIn.”

Next, follow the right people. Don’t be indiscriminate and follow everyone.
Instead, follow individuals who will:

1. Provide industry information that will benefit you or your customers and prospects.
2. Expand your network (for example, partners and suppliers).
3. Fit your buyer persona as a potential buyer of your product or service.

Following the right people, particularly on Twitter, will also help you build your audience.

Create a list of companies or individuals that you want to build a relationship with, and follow
them. Building your social audience might take some time. Focus on quality over quantity. Sure, it
gives you social clout to have thousands of followers, but if none of them are going to buy your
product, does it really matter?

What you really want to do with your prospects is build a relationship. Very few people like to be
sold to. What you want to do is build rapport first. And you do that when you...

Provide value. Respond with information or ideas or casual commentary. Give information away
for free. Provide advice. In other words, build trust.

But be careful when you decide to add the sales pitch. Your pitch needs to be at the right time and
presented in the right way. For example, a few years ago I was overseas and very frustrated about
my phone’s data plan.

T-Mobile knew they needed to be in the right place at the right time. They knew what they
offered was better than what I had at that moment. They offered exactly what I needed: unlimited
data. They also reached out after watching the conversation and seeing that their competitor
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Using Social Media to Build One-to-One Relationships

hadn’t responded after several hours. They brought me specific value at the right time and they
personalized it by including the initials of the sales person. When I DM’d them there was no
pressure, just information. But that exchange was enough for me to end a 25-year relationship with
my carrier to switch to T-Mobile who made me feel important, and as if I belonged. But...if I hadn’t
been looking to make a switch and they tweeted at me to switch the same message would have
come across as spammy and annoying. Timing is everything.
You should also follow up. Social selling takes time. Small touchpoints matter. Think about the
long game. This is especially good for product launches or the early stages of a product roadmap.
Begin networking early and build the rapport in the months before the product is available. That’s
the perfect time to have casual conversation that isn’t about your product but builds trust and
rapport, so when the time comes to sell, your audience is more receptive.

Always strive to be authentic. Don’t use canned messages. People can see your conversation
history and see that you say the same things to everyone, and then you just become spammy.

Contribute to groups on Facebook and LinkedIn. Again, it’s about being a valuable member of
the group. Provide value, not a sales pitch. Build trust and rapport by demonstrating your expertise
as a thought leader. This is also a tactic that will take time. But in a group you are bringing value to
a wide net of people, which means that your potential return could be that much greater.

One thing to think about is how you can try different types of content when interacting with
customers and prospects. Short videos with a tip or trick can be easy to create and they provide
value while humanizing you beyond email. When I came on board at HubSpot Academy, professor
Ai Zhang put together a short 19 second welcome video for me and I was floored. And I’ll never
forget her as a result and now I’m delighted to collaborate with her on projects. Now that is
powerful, right?

A few final thoughts. Social media used to be a bit freer but now people are becoming more
concerned about privacy. Additionally, spam is everywhere and you don’t want to be lumped in
with more nefarious sales people. So build a relationship first. Customize your messages and be
authentic. Also, don’t invade spaces that people may consider to be personal and private.
Facebook, for example, is more heavily used for private activities between friends and families, and
unless your audience has agreed to receive marketing messages from you, interactions may be
seen as invasive.

And last of all, be yourself. People want to interact with real people, not with brands. So there you
have it. Good luck and happy social selling!