BLOG: Brands must use social media streams to engage with their customers

Latest figures from Hitwise revealed that Facebook was recently the most-visited website in the US for a single week. This is a first for the social networking site and the record-breaking number of direct visits saw it outshine the most popular search engine in the world: Google.

Social networking sites witnessed huge growth in 2009 and there’s certainly no reason to suggest that their popularity is starting to wane. With Twitter reaching its fourth birthday in March, recent stats indicate that there are up to 50 million tweets per day – a staggering figure.

This research is evidence of an ongoing shift in US consumer behavior with more customers using social media sites than ever before. These sites harness the age-old power of word-of-mouth recommendation and are clearly potent marketing tools. If nothing else, they certainly demand a higher level of consumer engagement than conventional advertisements.

Unhappy customers who experience problems when conducting transactions online are starting to share these experiences on social media sites with 13% posting complaints in 2009 compared with 8% in 2008 according to findings of a Tealeaf survey of online customer behaviour. This is another timely reminder that businesses need to focus on the online customer experience and give it as much credence as offline activities.

There’s no hiding the fact that the US is more savvy than the UK in social media terms but consumers are continuing to turn to these websites with increasingly regularity.

Social media is a two way street and brands must use social networking sites to engage with their customers as well as broadcasting important information. They must utilize sites like Twitter and Facebook and tap into the human element in order to better understand the behaviours and spending habits of their consumers. Only then can they start to move forward.

by Neville Upton, Mar 31 2010, 02:49 PM