by Mark Bloom | Mar 4, 2016 | Social Media
Social Customer Service Nurtures Interaction
The old face of customer service: “Your call is very important to us.”
Ten years ago, most business owners didn’t realize they needed a website; almost all have one now. Five years ago, most business owners didn’t understand the value of engaging, targeted website content; the very existence of Ray Access proves that many now get it. Two years ago, most business owners avoided the murky waters of social media; today, many still don’t understand the power it holds for businesses.
Many small to medium-sized businesses view social media, when they view it at all, as a wasteland of Likes. One million Likes, they figure, won’t even buy a cup of coffee in the real world. These businesses may acknowledge that social media can raise brand awareness — after all, a million Likes means that a million people have at least heard of you — but social media campaigns rarely pay for themselves, let alone offer a return on the investment.
Social Media Has Changed
That was then; this is now. Social media is evolving into a forum for business — not just business awareness, but business transactions. Social media is a very public platform where one viral mistake can literally cost millions of dollars… and one viral home run can make millions of dollars.
Today, a whopping 75 percent of the American adult population spends time on social media. And that percentage is growing every year. To give you some perspective, only eight percent of American adults accessed social media sites just 10 years ago. One way that businesses can take advantage of this growing exposure on social media is to reach out to engage its customers.
Social Customer Service
The phrase “social customer service” simply refers to customer service — appeasing complaints, answering questions and solving problems — performed on social media platforms. Every successful business understands why good customer service is crucial to the customer experience. According to the Harvard Business Review, people who have a positive customer service experience are about three times more likely to recommend that business.
The new face of customer service: responsive and timely, even from a cell phone.
Social customer service, then, allows a business to publicly solve problems, which can generate some amazing trust and good will toward that business. Of course, the opposite is true too: a bad customer service experience in a social media context can turn into a nightmare scenario. So the trick to going social with your customer service is to maximize the good results and minimize the bad.
The Nature of Social Media
Facebook, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Twitter and all the other social media platforms provide instant gratification to users. Everything is fresh and immediate. That structure has pluses and minuses, and you can use both to your advantage. Here’s how:
- Highlighting the good: The ultimate for businesses in social media is a spontaneous testimonial. If you get one of these gems, make sure people see it. Feature it. Keep it fresh by commenting on it, sharing it and re-using it. Make sure your responses are honest and humble.
- Burying the bad: If you get a complaint, the best response is to try to turn it into a good experience. Offer to make it right whenever possible, and do it promptly. If you can convert a complainer into an evangelist for your company, that’s a big win. Otherwise, leave the comment alone. It will sink under the weight of other positive posts, by you and your fans, rarely to be seen again.
Interact Honestly
If you want to master social customer service, the first step is to gain a foothold in the social media space. Gain brand awareness. Then use your position to engage your customers and other fans. It’s not a platform for selling, but you can drive more traffic to your website, where the selling happens. Social customer service puts your customers in a good frame of mind to buy from you. All you have to do is play nice.
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
by Mark Bloom | Jul 16, 2014 | Content Marketing
Thank You, Bob Dylan, for Giving Us the Words
Like many writers, we know we can always count on Bob Dylan lyrics to illustrate a point. These words, originally penned in the early 1960s, are truer now than ever before, but we’re not speaking of political turmoil. We’re speaking of technology and search engine optimization. Is it a stretch? We don’t think so, and we’ve allotted ourselves 500 or so words to persuade you, too.
Here’s the Situation
The Internet has changed the way we find information, products and services. Instead of the Yellow Pages, we turn on a connected device. Instead of the dictionary, we visit a dictionary website. Instead of a catalog, we search online.
Yet how that process works — entering a phrase or question into a search engine — also changes all the time. Ostensibly, the search engines want to serve you the sites that most likely will answer your question, but it’s often not an easy question to answer, no matter how many 1s and 0s you use.
As a result, the Internet has gone through several changes, as search engines look for the best algorithm to deliver the answers you want. Then you have the tech savvy developers who fudge the system with keywords, backlinks and paid ads. The past few years have seen this tug of war reach epic proportions.
On top of all that are the changing stylistic preferences of the public’s changing tastes. They want drop-down menus, menus down the side, fewer words, more words, sidebars, no sidebars, lots of photos or one good video. If you tried to keep up, you spent a lot of money.
And the point is this: What can you make of the mess that the Internet has become? If you have a business website, how can you stay on the first page of results when the formula the search engine uses to determine what’s “relevant” keeps changing?
It’s a serious question that deserves a serious answer. Luckily, you don’t have to rely on a search engine for this answer. You have Ray Access.
Assess Your Website
If you haven’t updated your website in the past five years, you may not be taken seriously. It’s no longer enough just to have a website; you need an active site. You need to provide useful information to your audience. To get their business, you have to first attract their attention and then hold it with the answers they are searching for.
Keywords matter, but not as much as having information people want. Readability — subheadings and lists that make the content easy to scan — matters too, but only if you have information people want. Let Ray Access give you a website assessment to determine the strengths and weaknesses of your current site.
Obviously, if the information on your website is out of date, no one will return, even if they happen upon your site. Your website is your Yellow Pages entry, your storefront and your company reputation, all wrapped up in a pretty package. If you’re not attracting visitors to your website, it might be time for a facelift. Or at least a remodeling with new content. If you need help, ask us for some affordable guidance.
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
by Mark Bloom | Jun 20, 2014 | Small Business Advice
Why Your Customers Do Business with You
Every business faces competition. In America, competition is a given. It’s part of the invisible hand that moves markets. You likely don’t appreciate it, however, while your business is trying to make inroads into your competitors’ market share.
But competition is healthy. It can bring out the best in all of us, even if we lose the race, since the best lessons come not from victory but from defeat. And you can quote me on that.
What Do You Offer?
To get more business, you must have a strategy or plan or advantage over your rivals. Whatever it is — a superior product, 24/7/365 personalized customer service or simply that you have the best location — it is your unique value proposition. This is what sets you apart from your peers. It’s why you deserve a bigger share of the marketplace.
If you don’t have a unique value proposition, then you are no different from the shop down the street or the next service listed in the phone book. Without a unique value proposition, there’s no reason for potential customers to choose your business over another. So rethink your business plan and make sure you have a specific answer to that age-old question: Why should I buy from you?
How to Use Your Unique Value Proposition
You’ve done all the work and figured out your unique value proposition. You now know what sets your business apart. You have figured out why your business is so much better than your competition. So why doesn’t the world beat a path to your door? What’s holding you back?
The most obvious problem is that no one else knows what your unique value proposition is! Have you told anyone besides your spouse, your mom, and your employees? That’s right, you have to communicate your value to your target market, the very people who make the decisions to buy your products or services.
If you advertise, make sure your unique value proposition is front and center, clear and simple. Your potential customers want to know. You don’t have to persuade them to buy from you; you simply have to tell them why it’s in their best interest.
Ray Access Can Help
Ray Access is a content marketing firm. We provide content for your website, turning your site from a passive brochure into a attractive announcement. Your website should draw an audience and then turn those visitors into customers. That’s the purpose of a website. That’s the value of an effective website.
And that’s where Ray Access can help. We’ll turn your website into a marketing engine. We’ll expose your unique value proposition on every page. With words and pictures, we’ll give your visitors a reason to buy from you.
The Ray Access Value Proposition
So what’s our unique value proposition? You get two for the price of one. Ray Access is an everyday, all-the-time, true-blue BOGO. Buy one, get one free. There are other good writers out there and some pretty talented editors too. But when you hire Ray Access, you get both — every time.
No piece of writing leaves our hands until both Mark Bloom and Linda Ray have touched it. We each read and edit every blog, press release and web page. We bring years of professional journalism, book editing, magazine publishing, technical writing and research expertise to every job.
Contact us to discover how we can help you. You’ll quickly understand that Ray Access is more than a writing service. We provide content that will help your business grow.
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
by Elle Ray | Sep 13, 2013 | Small Business Advice
Confessions of a Freelance Content Provider
Between us, Mark and Linda have owned a number of small businesses. As writers and editors, the businesses we start never get very big… yet we always strive for excellence and always work hard at marketing our services. Despite that, we continually fall into the trap of losing that balance between working like crazy and looking for work like crazy.
Image courtesy of bplanet / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Some call it “the feast or famine cycle.” We’re not sure if that’s the best moniker for this syndrome, though. Maybe it should be “damned if you do and damned if you don’t.” If we’re working like crazy, that means we’re earning money, but we aren’t looking for future work. If we are looking for work like crazy, that means we aren’t earning any money. As a result, we try to find a balance, but we never can. We tend to approach our marketing efforts in a disorganized and disjointed way.
Marketing Sure Helps
We tell clients in person and in our blog that they must maintain their marketing to get consistent, effective results. While we’re pretty good about adding fresh content to our website — it is after all what we do best — we’re slackers when it comes to consistent marketing beyond the site. Part of the problem may be a certain amount of laziness, but one of the biggest hurdles is forcing ourselves to do those unpleasant tasks — like sales and cold calling. It’s hard work, even when we know the person we’re talking to can benefit from the services we provide.
At the same time, as Linda says, “it’s difficult to make myself look for work when I have plenty on my desk.” Both Linda and Mark freelance to other clients outside Ray Access. It’s a small but growing business that doesn’t yet provide enough income for both of us to survive on, so we can’t afford to ignore other ready streams of income in order to step up our marketing efforts. “Why spend money,” Linda asks, “when I can stay at my keyboard and make money?”
Identifying the Trap
And there’s the trap. We’ve experienced it in every business we’ve ever owned. We’ve heard countless similar tales from fellow entrepreneurs. It happened when Linda was reconditioning yachts on the Chesapeake Bay and when she headed a freelance writing business. It happened when Mark was trying to ramp up a video production company and when he ran his own editing business.
As Linda so aptly put it: “I’ll be so enamored with a single lucrative contract that I ignore the marketing end of the business. I’ll do the jobs I actually contract for and enjoy the most, while telling myself — life is good, why not? And then — bam! — the single biggest client decides to move out of town or close up shop. And I’m left in the dust. A contractor without a contract.”
This blog post falls outside of our usual informational topics — talking about the importance of putting great copy on your website — to give you a glimpse of the darker side of small business. You may already know all about it if you run a small company. If you don’t, let this serve as a warning.
Is open confession good for the soul? I don’t know and can’t think about it because I’ve got some writing to do. What keeps you up at night?
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
