On Wednesday, Liesel and I attended an early morning seminar. We learned about how companies can brand themselves and thrive in a ‘conversation’ economy.
A conversation economy stands for all the conversations your customers or clients are having and can have about your brand. If no one is talking about your brand then you DON’T exist – you want people talking.
No matter which way you look at social media it’s here and it’s here to stay. For example there are over 500 million active facebook users, over 18 million twitter users and there are about 175,000 weblogs created every day. That’s a lot of people talking to other people every day. People that could be talking about your brand.
The world is no longer B2B it’s now C2C – consumer to consumer. How can you as a company join these ‘conversations’? Very easily.
Think about what it takes to be a great conversationalist and apply that to the way you communicate to your clients and customers.
Here are some tips on how to have a great conversation with your customers:
- Be clear – Make sure your customers/clients know exactly what you’re selling.
- Listen – This is the most important, if you don’t hear what people are saying how can you contribute to the conversation?
- Focus the conversation on the other person (client/customer) – Put yourself in their shoes. What do they want/need?
- Be memorable – leave an impression on your client/customer that they tell friends and family about you or your service.
- Care – and mean it!
- Be opportunistic – What can you do to help them?
- Be there at the start of the conversation – Don’t walk in to a middle of a conversation and expect to know what was already said.
Remember if you’re not being talked about you don’t exist – join the conversation!
– Kara Hanko