Social CRM – content relationship management – is really a reference to the integration of social media channels into existing CRM platforms. By means of involving things like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn and more, modern CRMs are able to expand customer engagement, gather insights and build brand loyalty.
Unlike in the case of traditional CRM, in social CRM, the objective is to not only manage customer data but to improve the quality of interactions. Ultimately, the aim is to build a community around the brand in question and foster a deep sense of customer loyalty.
Some of the best CRM providers include:
Applications of Social CRM in Business
Social CRM has plenty of benefits to offer businesses, of which three main features stand out – that is, sales, marketing and customer relations.
Sales
By means of social CRM, businesses are able to accurately track the progress of various prospects within the sales funnel. Thus, sales teams are able to create an experience for users that is completely personalised as opposed to imposing a blanket, generalised approach.
But, it’s not only about individualisation. Social CRM allows sales teams to enjoy retained and improved business as customers start recommending your brand, ultimately leading to improved customer loyalty and increased revenue in the long run.
Marketing
Integrating social CRM into business operations can help improve general marketing tactics, leading to better lead generation and eventually, an improved ability to convert leads into sales.
Customer Relations
Most organisations that are involved in service, anything from hospitality to retail, make use of social media channels.
Customer service teams can use social media channels to track and manage customer contacts across business functions and different channels, allowing them to provide consumers with significantly better services than before, as well as with improved resolution times.
Why Is Social CRM Important?
Social CRM has become a key tool to help businesses build strong, long-lasting relationships with customers. Integrating social CRM into existing traditional CRM platforms and practices helps customers engage with the company in real-time, while the software is able to gather information about the customers simultaneously (from their behaviour) and also respond quickly to feedback.
The Advantages of Using Social CRM
The integration of social CRM into existing, traditional CRM platforms offers a variety of benefits to companies, both in the long and the short term.
- Interact In Real Time: Using social CRM gives business the opportunity to be able to interact and engage with customers in real-time. Whether this is responding to complaints or general enquiries, customers are always happier when they receive quick responses.
- Deliver Customer Support Via Relevant Platforms: Since social CRMs are integrated into traditional CRMs, it means that not only can customers submit queries directly through the relevant platform, they’ll be able to receive responses through the same platform.
- Improve and Deepen Relationships with Customers: Social CRM allows for communication between businesses and customers to be drastically improved which, in the long run, results in deepened relationships that are far longer lasting and more meaningful.
- More Brand Loyalty: More communication means a better relationship between customer and company, and the better the relationship, the more brand loyalty you’ll experience which tends to result in customer retention over time.
- More Effective Marketing: Social CRM helps businesses understand their customers better which means that they’re able to do more targeted marketing which, ultimately, tends to be significantly more effective than blanket marketing.
Overall, by integrating social CRM into your existing business practices, you’ll be able to improve just about all of your operations. From improving communication to developing strong, long-term relationships, the use of social CRM in business has the potential to be really beneficial in the long run.
