Denise Shiffman’s Engage Daily Blog

What is the cost of implementing social networking, and how do we measure success? Most executives want to know. A more important question is what is the cost of not doing social networking?

Setting up a site where your customers can talk to each other provides amazing value. You set up the platform, they do the work. Customers create a high value data source that keeps them coming back and attracts others to the site.

Social sites and blogs have turned out to be a highly effective early warning system. Companies are learning of problems they didn’t know they had and fixing them much more quickly. The biggest fear I hear from executives is that customers will rant about the problems we already know we have, but that take time to fix.

So these customers are ranting privately now and trying to figure out how not to use your product or service. They’re talking to your competitors instead of talking to other customers and the company trying to help solve these issues. If you know what your problems are, it’s likely the marketplace knows them too. Airing the issue and having a real, personal conversation with your audience about what you’re doing to fix these problems can keep customers from running away from you. It can build loyalty.

Why wait for your competitors to beat you to the punch and treat customers better.

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