10 Tips to Boost Revenue with Social Support Commerce

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If you’ve only thought of social media as a marketing platform, think again. 

Facebook, Instagram, and other platforms offer unique opportunities to engage customers, increasing your brand’s reach by providing superior customer service and improving retention. 

Take a look at these strategies for using social support commerce to boost your revenue and be sure to download our infographic, 10 Tips to Boost Revenue with Social Support Commerce.

1. Reimagine what customer support could be.

Don’t limit yourself to handling problems and complaints. Customer support can include anything that makes your customers feel more connected to your brand. 

2. Help your customers right where they are in the channel they love.

Instead of pushing customers into another channel they may not want to use, offer help where they already are.

3. Equip your support team with the latest promotions. 

Make sure your support heroes can see posted promotions in a customer’s profile, so they can reference them in conversations.

4. Answer product questions. 

Perhaps the greatest virtue of using social media instead of your website for e-commerce is that it increases your ability to monitor discussion and answer questions about your product. 

Take care to reach the lowest hanging fruit on this first. When a customer reaches out with a question, answer it. To do this well, when you post promotions, have someone keep track of comments under them. 

For example, if a customer asks: “Does this come in blue?” be sure to answer. If the answer is “no,” have the sales representative suggest an alternate similar product that might appeal to them. 

5. Empower your support team with shopping histories.

When Instagram first rolled out Shopping options, businesses were concerned that they might not be able to capture customer information. Recent integrations, however, have not only made that possible but have also allowed for customer service agents to build a log of conversations and comments. 

Set this up to build a fuller profile and strengthen individualized recommendations. Your heroes can now see what a shopper has liked in the past and recommend favorite items on sale.

6. Leverage your fan base. 

If you get service right, you’ll have customers doing your promotions for you. 

To encourage interaction, use unique hashtags to make this smooth and trackable. You can also prompt your customers to tag you in unboxing videos and pictures. 

Customer-generated content like this serves as social proof and as free promotional material. 

7. Publicly thank your customers. 

When a customer says, “I loved the service!” be sure to respond with at least a simple “Thanks!” 

This shows you’re listening and can go a long way to turning customers into ambassadors. Plus, who doesn’t love a personal call-out?

8. Leverage DMs. 

More people open and respond to their direct messages than to their email. While you should never spam, do send thoughtful recommendations to your customers to follow up with questions or comments. 

9. Respond to customer complaints. 

Over 70% of customers have already used social media to reach out to customer service at least once. While this may mean that they’re posting about your company critically, it also offers an opportunity for resolution. 

Our advice is to view this as a good thing! If a customer comments that a package is “taking forever,” be sure to reply with empathy and engage them directly. Reply to the original post so that you can show off your excellent customer service, but do feel free to move the conversation to DMs from there. 

Not only does engaging negative posts retain the original customer, but it also allows other online browsers to see that you’re trustworthy and responsive. 

10. Develop a radically personal support system. 

With many customers shopping across multiple channels, it’s entirely possible that someone will forget which medium they used to reach out to you the first time. 

In order to best serve your customers, your staff will need to see their website chat history, Facebook Messaging, Instagram comments, and phone conversations all in one space. Choose a tool that integrates your customer history so you can see their past orders and conversations across all channels, all in one view. 

Companies who engage with customers on social media increase revenue by 20-40%.

Start using these tips and more to grow your brand’s revenue today.

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