FreshNetworks Blog

Last week I spent a few days at the Executive Customer Contact Exchange networking event and it was really interesting to hear why social media is firmly on the radar of the customer service and customer experience directors that were there.

What did surprise me somewhat though was that among the 20 or so sponsors attending, which included big names such as SAP and RightNow, FreshNetworks was the only specialist social media agency to attend the event.

Does this mean that most of the other social media and digital agencies are still focused purely on social media marketing or social PR? Perhaps. Either way, customer experience directors would do well to think about what Joseph Jaffe outlines in his brilliant book Flip The Funnel.

In Flip the Funnel, Jaffe highlights that the focus of most marketing spend is usually around new customer acquisition and that only 20% of marketing budgets are typically spent on retention. Yet, in many cases, 75% of revenues comes from existing customers.

Jaffe goes on to argue that instead of ending with the customer as in the traditional marketing funnel, the funnel should be flipped so that it begins with the customer.

To me, social media is the ideal way of putting the customer first. It’s also the perfect way of using existing customers to gain new ones.

If your prospective customers see you as being  proactive, responsive and accessible through the way you engage with your existing customers, surely this will help to convert them. What’s more, using social media in this way will help develop advocacy among existing customers, and if  they are happy with their experience they are one step closer to becoming your brand advocates.

Perhaps it’s time for customer experience teams to harness the power of existing customers in order to encourage acquisition of new ones. Thinking about retention may be the key to new customer acquistion through social media.

Interested in learning more about social media and the customer experience? Why not come to the European Customer World Experience 2011 from 24th – 26th May. Register for tickets here.