Your
company's got great customer service and a stellar social media presence. But
have you ever thought about marrying the two?
In
this episode of The Digital Exec, we sit down with Abram Herman
from Associated Bodywork and Massage Professionals to discuss the
concept of delivering great customer service on social media.
If
you're feeling stuck in your social media efforts, this episode is for
you. We cover topics ranging from hiding behind your social media to
responding privately to messages and more. Learn what makes organizations
successful on social media and how to implement an outstanding customer service
culture. If you want to know how to keep your customers happy by delivering
great customer experiences online, you'll want to listen!
Michael: Okay, we are live. Michael
Reynolds here with SpinWeb with Digital Exec #7. I'm here with Abram
Herman.
Abram, how are you today?
Abram: I'm good. How are you
doing, Michael?
Michael: Excellent. Glad to have you. Abram is
the Social Media and Marketing Coordinator for Associated Bodywork and Massage
Professionals or ABMP for short, and I'm now going to say ABMP
because it would take forever to say the rest.
Abram: That's much easier.
Michael: ABMP is, if I'm correct, the largest
membership organization for massage therapists with over 80,000 members,
correct?
Abram: Yes, by far we are the largest.
With over 80,000 and then we also have sister divisions that work with
aestheticians and cosmetologists. And we're also the largest association
in those fields as well.
Michael: That's great. So the reason I
want to talk to you today is because you do a phenomenal job of delivering
customer service on social media. Our topic today is How to Deliver Great
Customer Service on Social Media.
You
come at this from an association perspective, so a lot of our nonprofits and associations
listening will really benefit from this, because who today is not interested in
providing great customer service in general and especially on social media
because everyone is there? A lot of people are talking about it and are trying
to figure out how to deliver that effectively. So, how to really do that?
And, by the way, how long have you been with ABMP?
Abram: That's a good question. It'll be
four years in April of 2014.
Michael: And you're in Colorado, correct?
Abram: Yes, Colorado. Right up in the mountains.
Michael: I often see your exploits of you mountain
climbing in the beautiful mountains of Colorado and I get jealous. I'm like,
"Oh, why aren't I in Colorado right now?"
Just
to kind of kick things off, what makes you so great at delivering customer
service on social media?
Abram:
One of the things is an
element of experience. You know I've had a lot of customer service oriented
roles, so even though my role now is more in marketing, there is a huge
component of customer service in social media even though it does serve a
marketing purpose for most organizations and especially for associations. One
is just experience and knowing how to deal with people.
I
try to remember when I'm dealing with social media, you're dealing with huge
numbers of people. If I put out a post, it might be seen by
25,000 or 30,000 people. But in a customer service perspective, I
think you can tend to lose sight of the fact that those 25,000 people are
humans.
Michael: Right.
Abram: Just like we have the vitriolic trolls in
comment sections that, for the same reason, Popular Science just closed their
comment section, it can be easy to feel really removed when you're using
technology. So one of the things I always try and remember is, whoever I'm
dealing with, even if they're angry at us and even if we're trying to smooth
things over, there's somebody with legitimate concerns.
I
have to remind myself that the person I'm dealing with is somebody who wants to
be related to personally. That's really the ultimate benefit of social
media is it gets you that chance to have a personal level of connection rather
than just email blasts and a website and things that are for everybody. This is
something that meets people where they're at. It gives you a chance to
show the personality of your people and of your company as a whole. I try and
never remove the human component from it.
I
always keep in mind that old kind of marketing saying that people want to do
business with other people; they don't want to do business with a company.
I
try to be genuine. I always sign my name in my correspondence so they know that
there's a human on the other end. I just try to remember that there are really
people on the other end and it's not just a random Internet interaction.
Michael: I think you've really hit on one of the
primary points of this concept. I see a lot of brands, a lot of companies, a
lot of organizations -- for profit and nonprofit alike -- that hide behind
their social media. If someone asks a question on Facebook, for example, they
respond in this very, kind of surface marketing speak or this kind of legal
speak and they just kind of spout a policy out. They don't sign a name. They
don't really know who they're talking to. It's very impersonal. Even on social
media, they somehow manage to make it seem very impersonal. That can be
frustrating for people. So it's really nice to hear that you really empathize
the personal aspect of it and you identify yourself by name. You say,
"Hey, there's a real person here," so that really makes a big
difference, I think.
Abram: And along the lines of what you're saying,
it also speaks to a bigger element of your business. One of the huge benefits
of social media is the transparency and the ability to show what's going on
behind the scenes and why you're making the decisions you are. For somebody in
my position, I work for a fantastic company and we honestly have nothing to
hide, so as a social media, PR, and marketing person, it makes my job
fairly easy.
We're
not Goldman Sachs or some company that people just don't like. We're made up of
really great employees and I'm seeing a lot of amazing things that the company
has done behind the scenes that we don't necessarily publicize so it makes it
very easy. I think maybe that's something to think about in social media is, if
you feel like you have to hide things and if you feel like you shouldn't have
transparency, maybe that says something on a bigger level about how the
business should be run rather than how your communication avenues should be
run.
Michael: I forgot who said it, but one of the
marketing experts I follow said something to the effect of social media doesn't
change your marketing, but basically amplifies who you already are as a
company. So if you're already a great company and have great people, social
media will amplify that. If you have problems, social media will
also amplify that so I think that's very relevant.
So
what kind of questions do you typically get on social media? I know you're very
active in the LinkedIn groups and you're very active on Facebook and on
Twitter; those are kind of the primary mediums I see ABMP responding in. What
kind of questions do you typically get and how do you handle them?
Abram: In our business, we get every
question you can think of and then some. Because we are the largest
organization in the profession, not only are our members looking to
us to get information and to help them find the things that they need, but even
legislators and government officials and that kind of thing look to us standard
setting because we know how the profession works and we know how to do things
properly.
Our
questions literally run the gambit from I can't figure out how to use this
member benefit to I want to know metrics for the profession or I have a legal
insurance question or even some off the wall questions. I had a random guy from
a Saudi Arabian company message us on Facebook the other day asking for a
diagnosis of his skin condition so it can be just about anything.
Michael: Well that's a good segway into what's on my
mind next. How do you know when to answer something publicly versus take it
offline?
Abram: Generally, I try and do almost everything
publicly unless there's actually a privacy concern for the person on the other
end. If we're exchanging their member ID number of if they want to give me a
credit card to pay for something, obviously we're not going to do that
publicly.
Again,
it goes back to kind of the zeitgeist to your company. We don't have anything
to hide so I think it's only a benefit to us to deal with people publicly and
to respond to their questions publicly because not only can other people see
the justification behind what we're doing, but they can also see we're
responsive to people. You don't want to leave an answer hanging out in the
public realm and answer it privately and then everybody who sees it
publicly thinks that it never got responded to.
I
keep almost everything public unless there's really a reason -- if there is
some proprietary information or some confidential information on the member's
part -- that's the only time I would really take it out of the public.
Michael: I really love that because I often
see the organizations like banks or financial organizations that have people
Tweet them questions and all they ever do is say, "Call Customer
Service" and give the number. Or they say, "Message me offline"
or "email me." Well, no, you're on Twitter so answer me on Twitter.
Abram: Exactly. That's really an annoying
thing to do to somebody. If they're talking to you on one channel, that's the
channel they want to talk to you on and you don't get to; if somebody Tweets
you, you don't say send me a 400-page letter on the subject, so why put them in
any other channel?
Michael: I appreciate that about your method,
so that's good to see. What tools, if any, do you use to monitor? Do
you have any special software that helps you really monitor what's going on
with your members or with the public, in general, and helps you respond better?
Abram: I have hundreds of Google alerts set
up, both for the company name and the industry that we're in, for all three
associations that we work with. Beyond that, HootSuite is the main one that I
use for Twitter. I don't find a lot of use for it for things like Facebook or
the other networks. I really use it exclusively for Twitter. Other than that,
just basically being in there everyday, at least once a day I open up my
bookmarks folder that has my daily social media tasks. Essentially, I'll go
into LinkedIn to see what's going on there and go into Facebook to see what's
going on there. I don't want to miss anything so I use the native applications
for most of all Facebook and LinkedIn, and for Twitter I just use HootSuite
exclusively.
Michael: So really it comes down to paying attention.
All the fancy tools in the world won't necessarily fix the problem of just
not paying attention. I see a lot of people that talk to me and say well, I'm
not really on Facebook or I'm not really on Twitter and I don't really
want to be there. That really tells me they don't really enjoy the medium; they
don't get the medium.
Do
you feel like you have to really enjoy the medium and enjoy that type of
communication to be really good at customer service on social media or do you
feel like that can be turned into a process despite a lack of interest in it?
Abram: I guess you could conceivably turn it into
a process, but you're not going to have the same results. I think in the
customer service sense, you have to have a passion for what you're doing the
way that you're doing it, but beyond that, just to stay up to date in the
social world, I have to be interested in what's the latest Facebook change,
what's the latest Twitter update, or what's the latest change in the Instagram
app? It's not optional; it's not like when I feel like it I'll use these
features. I have to be interested and passionate, and I'm interested in what
these social networks can lead to.
It's
an incredible thing from just a human perspective of what's happening with
these social networks and the vast amounts of data and the kind of connections
they enable. Even like us talking on a Google hangout, I think originally I
friended you on Facebook because of some business deal we had elsewhere.
The
connection to me is fascinating, the science behind what they're doing is
fascinating, and the technology is absolutely fascinating; they're setting
precedents for how to handle big data and how to connect people and that kind
of thing. You have to be really interested in it just to stay up to date on
what's going on and how the platforms are evolving and how to make use of them.
Again,
to what you said, just to be happy and passionate about what you do comes
through in your customer service. I enjoy Twitter and if there's somebody who
doesn't see the value in Twitter or who thinks that it's just some place that
people go to post the latest meal that they had, you're not going to come
across as somebody who is warm and friendly and happy to be engaging with
somebody on the Twitter medium.
It
definitely is essential, although you conceivably could parcel it out to some
set of robotic instructions, but that's not what customer service is.
Michael: And you have to like people. I know a
lot of customer service reps that I encounter don't seem like they like people
at all. I'm on the phone with them and they just don't want to be there, they
don't want to be helping anybody, they'd rather be anywhere else but talking to
just a person. I wonder how these people get hired. I mean you really have to
like people to be good at customer service whether it's on the phone or on
social media. So the same rules apply everywhere I think.
Abram: Yes, you have to like people and even
beyond that, you have to like helping people, not just like being around them.
People are going to be coming to you with problems all the time and you can
either see it as, "Oh God, I have another complaint" or "I
have another thing that's wrong," or you can see it as, "Hey, there's
a person who I can totally turn around and I can give them a fantastic
experience," and turn them from somebody who is complaining into kind of a
grand ambassador or somebody who loves us.
I
think seeing them as opportunities and loving that process of helping people; I
mean, in our business especially, we're kind of helping people pursue their
dreams. These are all independent practitioners who got into a profession that
they love and created a business for themselves. If they're asking you how to
use a resources, it's not just it's a tool it'd be nice to have, it's like
they're trying to fulfill their livelihood.
You
really do need to keep, like I said in the beginning, keep that human element
and remember the people behind who you're actually talking to; all the humans
that are on the other side.
Michael: What benefit has this brought to ABMP?
You're very successful in being the largest association for massage therapists
and others. Obviously, a lot of success has come from, I'm assuming,
just as many other sources, but what sorts of benefits do you find from
being this customer service oriented on social media for the company?
Abram: There's of course the direct ones,
kind of a direct ROI, but the holy grail of social media and marketing in
general of turning it into sales and gaining new members is part of it. So it's
a great evangelist in that sense that if we come up with good content or if
we're a good source for industry news, people find out about us and, of course,
that's a good thing.
Even
beyond that, I think going back to what I said of changing people's minds and
turning it into a healthy relationship because you're always going to have
naysayers whatever your business is and, social media, because it's so
transparent and so personal, it gives you a chance to have that personal
connection with somebody. It's much harder to yell at a person than it is to
yell at a business. Beyond that, if you have a person who finds the solution to
your problem, somebody is going to remember that. They are going to remember
the personal time that was taken.
I
think that over the last -- I started with the company almost four years ago --
but social media has been maybe for the last 2 to 2-1/2 years and in that time,
I've made tons of connections and it's a lot of people who really weren't
connected to ABMP and now they're our biggest supporters. They're the people
who are sharing when we have a new comment in there and the people who are
telling their friends, "Look, there's all this new stuff that these guys
are doing, why don't you check them out?"
Word
of mouth is a huge thing and social media is just a huge way to amplify that
instead of telling somebody one on one, face to face, this is a chance for your
biggest supporters to tell 500 of their friends or a thousand of their friends
at once about why they love your company. In that sense, I think the biggest
benefit I see beyond just the direct ROI and sales, the thing that marketers
look at is creating that relationship with so many individuals; creating a real
personal relationship with our members. We have 80,000 of them, but they're
still these people I connect with on a daily basis. We Tweet back and
forth, we Facebook message, I read their blogs that they share on the
company page every once in a while; those personal relationships are huge for
any business, no matter how big you are.
Michael: I'm glad you mentioned the blog as
well because the one thing I find remarkable about ABMP is that your company
President personally blogs on your website. It's very personal, very
conversational, very engaging, and there's the company President of an 80,000
member organization posting on the company blog. I love that. I
think that's beautiful.
Abram: That's just how we operate. Les is an
awesome guy; he's hilarious. He may be the President and he may be the
boss, but everybody here loves him because he's just a funny character and he's
a great guy. Having somebody like that as the public face of your company is
awesome, but that's ingrained in our culture too. One thing that a lot of
people might not know is that we make these kind of retention phone calls, so
if a member expires, we call them up and we say, "Hey, we wanted to make
sure you knew that your membership expired and if you're interested in renewing
for another year and staying with us." That's something that everybody in
the company does.
We
have Les, the President, and Bob, the CEO, who basically run the company, but
you're just as likely to be called by the CEO of the company as you are by
anybody in the membership department or me or anybody else. And if you call and
the phones are ringing off the hook, we have what's called like a primary over
ring where if there's not enough people in membership to pick up the phone, it
rings throughout the office and Les will pick those up or Bob will pick those
up.
That's
just part of the company culture. They're not sitting in some gilded
office with gold on the walls and diamonds in the ceiling. If a member
calls and there's nobody else to pick up the phone, the CEO is going to pick up
the phone because that's a member. So it's a pretty cool atmosphere in that
way.
Michael: I love that. One more question because I
know a lot of people listening are probably wondering: I would love to take
this next step and to bring my company or my organization online to a customer
service mindset on social media and really be great at it and really engage
with members, customers, or prospects there. Do they go out and hire
an Abram? Do they have to hire in-house? Can they do a hybrid approach working
with other companies? Do they have to do a cultural shift and training inside
the company? What is the next step in getting there to get to the point
where they can be in the same place as you and ABMP?
Abram: I think there's a lot of different roads
you can take to that same destination. On the one side, you can have somebody
like me who is passionate about customer service and passionate about the
medium, and willing to do that, but it can also be learned. I think the biggest
over-arching, you know, broadest statement I can make on the subject is that I
think there's a tendency for social medial to be an afterthought for a lot of
companies. It's like, "We need a Facebook account. Give it to the intern
and he can run it." Yeah, that's not at all the way to do
it. You wouldn't put your intern up on a podium in front of 5,000
people giving a speech about your company so why would you do the same with
social media when it might be 100,000 people or a million people, depending on
your business?
I
think the first thing is really take it seriously. It's not an afterthought and
it's not a chore, it's a huge opportunity and treat it accordingly. Put your
best people on it or find somebody who is going to be effective at it and don't
just brush it aside and say, "We'll do this when we have time"
or "We'll give it to this guy because he has more room on his
plate." Really focus on it and consider it a primary objective rather than
just an afterthought would be my biggest advice.
Michael: Well, Abram, you're very good at your job
and I really enjoy watching the service you provide to your members online on
Facebook, on LinkedIn, on Twitter, on other networks. You do an awesome job and
this has been extremely insightful. I appreciate it.
Abram: Thank you. I appreciate it.
Michael: Let's end with a shout out to ABMP.
Tell me what makes ABMP great. What would our viewers and listeners love to
know about ABMP?
Abram: Oh, there are so many things. I
mean, the easiest way to say it is there's a really good reason that we're by
far the largest association in the U.S. and our members know it. If you're not
a member, you need to find out because beyond just the liability insurance,
which is a huge part of what we do and why we have members, the resources that
we offer and the customer service has always been a huge focus. Like I said,
the CEO might pick up the phone when you call.
It's
so hard to pin it down to one thing because overall it's just a great company.
I don't say that because I'm in a sense a PR person or because I'm a face for
the organization, it's because I love that the organization makes my job so
easy because we really are doing great things. That's the only way I can put
it. I can't pin it down to one thing, but overall it's just a
fantastic company and I know that from the inside.
Michael: Well, our viewers and listeners can
find ABMP online at ABMP.com and there is, of course, links to other social
properties from there so definitely everyone check them out and follow online.
You could learn a lot by following Abram at ABMP. And we appreciate your
time. It's been awesome.
Abram: Thank you Michael.
Michael: I want to thank everyone for joining and
thanks Abram. Have a great day. We'll see you next time.
If
you're a visual person, you can watch the video of our Hangout. Or if you'd prefer
the audio version, it's available here. You won't want to miss this
opportunity to be entertained by two professionals while learning how to raise
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Tune
in next time for our next installment of The Digital Exec, your source for becoming an expert in the
latest and greatest technology.
