It is often misunderstood that managing social media is easy for brands. I mean, we all do Facebook. So what can be the big deal about managing a brand presence on Social Media.

Well, for one, going from a comfortable, many times edited broadcast mode communication, to a real time, interactive space, where responses go out on the fly, is a huge bridge to cross. That is where the challenge begins. And then, it can get bigger!

Let’s look at this example, where perhaps, on behalf of the brand, someone with lack of understanding, lack of language skills, or both, decided to respond to comments on a Facebook post:

The disaster that can happen is for all to see.

Maybe English was not the primary language for the person replying. And she did not get the word ‘shameful’. What if it was a one-time unfortunate accident. But by the fact that this screen shot has gone around the world, many times over, the damage to the brand has been done. And badly.

Let’s look at another example. This was in fact, a well-intentioned effort, from a global leader and a household name, McDonald’s.

They’re been very active on social media, have done interesting activations, and have engaged their fans.

So it was not surprising that they initiated a hashtag #McDStories, where they hoped and expected that customers may share fun stories linked with McDonald’s.

But the campaign backfired and how.

Check out the detailed story which shows how the #McDStories hashtag became instead a bashtag. While there may have been consumers who had genuine, interesting McDonald’s stories to share, there were others who used the opportunity to bring out the horror stories of their McDonald’s experiences, from unhealthy food, to poor working conditions, and everything else in between.

Clearly a well intentioned effort that went horribly wrong.

There have been other cases where brands have had trouble, while engaging with consumers on social media. A case closer to home in India was about Cafe Coffee Day, when a fairly active social media brand had a trending hashtag in the form of #ccdsucks.

All of these cases show that:

1. Social media is clearly a double-edged sword for brands.

2. There is extreme participation of consumers around brands. Good and bad experiences can get quickly amplified. Whether the brands like it or not.

3. Brands need to have a sense of preparation, for things that could go wrong. While a #CCDSucks or a #McDStories cannot be necessarily foreseen, a fundamental awareness that things can go wrong, and a broad strategic approach for such situations, is something that brands need to have in place. Typically, before an incident occurs.

4. Often the understanding to manage such crisis is not internal, within organizations. This is due to a lack of experience in real time interactive spaces, and the eagerness to be “in control” always. The latter eagerness can often get brands to take impulsive steps that may not be the wisest ones after all! The Vodafone case when the brand tried to sue a consumer who was complaining about their services on social media, is an example of this.

Simple pointers for brands at this point are:

1. Your consumers are present and talking on social media. Whether the brand is present there or not. So just because there are challenges, to not be present on social media, is not even an option for brands.

2. Brands need to prepare themselves well. They cannot trivialize social media and relegate it to a lower level, in the corporate hierarchy. Senior management must participate in decisions related to social media.

3. Being prepared for eventualities helps in not being totally surprised.

4. Adequate budgets need to be apportioned. Just because Facebook or Twitter are free to use does not mean that brand budgets for social media should be peanuts!

5. And brands should really engage with agencies or consultants who “get” the medium. There are cheap ad film makers, but brands still go for the best in the business. Because stakes are high. The same kind of thought must prevail while making choices in selection of a social media agency!

With all that, social media’s an exciting space. One just needs to work harder, on a 24×7 basis!

Wikileaks in the world and RadiaGate in India have suddenly exposed the world to a new set of possibilities. And a new set of vulnerabilities.

Conversations, be it on phone or in other electronic formats, and which one assumed to have been private and secure, can actually become very public and embarrassing for the people involved! While the legality of the public appearance of Wikileaks and RadiaGate conversations may be open to judgement, another form of conversations that are clearly legal and yet equally potentially damaging are the kind that are happening in various spaces of Social Media. For a brand or an individual, there is as much damage to fear in Wikileaks or RadiaGate mentions, as it is in damaging Social Media conversations!

Considering a certain parallel between these situations then, I would like to share some learnings from a RadiaGate situation, which can in turn be useful, in tackling Online Reputation Management challenges, for brands, via Social Media.

The bigger story of Nira Radia’s taped conversations, the 2G telecom scam, the role played by corporates and politicians, and many more of those issues, will take a long time to become clear. This post is not about RadiaGate or its fall out, per se.

What this post strives to attempt, is to relate the early response from Ratan Tata, in RadiaGate and map it to a possible ORM challenge for a brand, and see what learnings we can take from the same.

So here is what happened, in this context:

Several telephonic conversations involving lobbyist Nira Radia were tapped, and many of these conversations made their way to the public space, via links posted on the Outlook magazine website.

Nira Radia happened to be officially appointed by the Tatas, as their PR representative, and would have been looking after many corporate matters related to the Tatas. As a part of such management, the Chairman of Tatas. Mr. Ratan Tata, would also have need to talk to Nira Radia, sometimes. Now since the phones of Nira Radia were tapped, and those tapped conversations went public, what also went public, were some of her conversations with her client, Ratan Tata.

Considering the stature of Ratan Tata, this was extremely embarrassing, to say the least. Similar small bits of conversations that Mukesh Ambani (another client of Nira Radia) had with Nira, also went public, likewise.

Well, Ratan Tata was angry. As anyone in his place would. But unlike many others, Ratan Tata chose to go public with his feelings, condemning the leaks. It took everyone by surprise, as first of all, Ratan Tata is not one to go to the media ever so often, and secondly, on account of his direct involvement in some of the leaked conversations! Both, the extent and the manner of his response, surprised everyone.

Whether he should have gone public in this manner, with his thoughts or not, could there have been other, better options are all a matter of conjecture.

But visualize the same kind of dirt flying on the Social Media space, instead of publicly accessible tapes. Then, from an ORM point of view, would this have been a right thing to do? What could have been the best means to handle a crisis of this kind?

Recognize first, that there was indeed a crisis. The goodwill of the Tata name had got shaken. It was made to appear that Tatas, like any other group, also use lobbying, to get favors for themselves. And because you hold a person and a group in such high esteem, therefore, it hurts even more. For the hero to have fallen, and seem like an ordinary mortal after all.

It was in the backdrop of such feelings that the public harboured, did Ratan Tata’s protests came. Here then, are some views on this, from and ORM perspective:

1. If as a company or a large brand, you are attacked by far smaller entities – the bloggerati and all – the last thing you want to start doing, is to show how powerful you are. If you come out like an elephant willing to trample them all away, it can only backfire. As the first reactions to Ratan Tata’s strong response showed. In spite of the great respect that the country has for Ratan Tata and the Tata name, when Ratan Tata himself chose to come out and show anger, it appeared as if reality had stung him. That his group had also tried to manipulate (in their own way) for spectrum etc. appeared to question the lofty standards of the Tata group.

Besides everything else, when Ratan Tata takes the fight to the open, it indeed becomes an open fight! And people like MP Rajeev Chandrashekar chose to also take him on, in public, and suddenly it appeared to a lot of dirty linen out for everyone to see!

2. So if one does not come out strongly, does that mean that one takes negative press (and negative social media) lying down? Surely not. There IS a need to act. And act fast too.

In the recently concluded Click Asia Summit, after my talk, I was asked this question. Whether in the totally unpredictable world of Social Media, a company can at all plan its footsteps?! Could the Tata group have “planned” for a situation like RadiaGate?

No, you cannot PLAN for an exact situation. In this very open world of electronic information, Wikileaks and RadiaGate WILL happen. You just don’t know what the next one will be like. And what damage it will cause. So while you cannot plan the exact nature of response, you CAN prepare a protocol and be ready. And not have to be randomly impulsive, and potentially put your foot into your mouth!

Companies need to have a plan, and genuine training to the team, to deal with these new media related challenges that can come any day! A key starting point is to have a Media Monitoring plan in place, especially a Social Media Monitoring one!

3. As a part of the plan, empower the frontline team to respond! I remember the live coverage of 26/11 and the various authorities in whose face, media was prepared to stick a mike. And how they had no clue what to really say. There was no coordinated response, neither was there a preparation at most places, about the ways to deal with situations of this kind. Where 26/11 was television, worst is the case with social media, where any kind of negative news can come, for your brand, and can potentially snowball. Before a Ratan Tata intervened, there would have been lots of questions posed to the frontline folks in Tata Communications. Were they equipped to give any kind of response at all?

4. Play in the same field. So, if someone has put a strong message against you in an online forum, and you choose to go and call a press conference in response. That does not work. No can do. The biggest conversations – at least in open forums – about Ratan Tata and Barkha Dutt and Nira Radia were all happening on Social Media. Ratan Tata, writing a letter in mainline press, or doing a press conference, was fine. But he let the tongues continue to wag on Social Media.

It was important to respond in this space also. Whether it was by posting a YouTube video and then have a team responding back to other queries, or whatever.

5. Strengthen your team with external forces! Yes, you can shout yourself hoarse with your side of the story, and there will always be people who will doubt it. And the more you say, the more questions will be raised, and the more risk of being perceived as guilty! However, can you get force multipliers in terms of external support? Consolidate third party opinions that agree with yours, and give your point of view, that much more credence. Instead of just Ratan Tata fighting the lone battle on behalf of the Tata group, including taking on Rajeev Chandrashekar and the Congress government, could there have been other credible sources who could have been brought in, to strengthen the Tata story? And give it better credibility?

Same approach works in Social Media as well!

6. This is the time when all your earlier good work comes to help. Yes, all those testimonials and your credentials that you have been building up. This is the time to go out and leverage those. Used in a subtle way, the testimonials and credentials now need to give additional credibility to your view point, and make people question the allegations against your brand. Tata might have done it in some measure and could have done a lot more. And you can do it too, in the possible face of any negative mentions against you, on Social Media.

In summary, I would emphasize that there will be more Wikileaks and more RadiaGates. There will also be more of the Dominos cases or the Nestle Greenpeace attacks. This is the new world, the world of new media as well.

It is not about hoping (praying??) that it does not happen to you. But about being aware of the possibility first, and then about having preparation for such eventualities.

Yes, we can learn from what Ratan Tata did right, and also from what he did not do so right.

Richard Branson of Virgin Group has been an entrepreneur’s icon for long, and I am glad to read his pieces in the Mint, weekly. It was very fascinating to read his piece about Marketing in the Age of New Media. The interesting part was that a lot of the content there was what I have also been talking about, to clients and at events and conferences. So, to read about the same concepts from Richard Branson, was heartening, and also a validation of sorts.

As Branson mentions, we have also experienced the struggle amongst senior executives, marketing folks, chief executives, founders of companies, as they try to cope first with digital media, and then with an interactive format in terms of Social Media. From living in denial, to over-reacting, we have seen these folks responding in various different ways. But few are taking sensible steps and making decent headway, in this new world of new media!

Some specific sentences from Branson’s article, and those who have heard me, might be pardoned for mistaking these as my own thoughts – they are so similar:

People no longer want to be sold to; they want companies to help them find an informed way to buy the right product or service at the right price.

They still watch ads, but often online rather than on TV, and they’re much more likely to view ads that friends have recommended.

When something goes wrong with a product, they want to be able to reach the company instantly, and they expect quick solutions.

All of these are the true essence of Social Media. Social Media presence is not just about that simple Facebook page. It is a part of your entire business process, as you can see here.

Branson adds:

The website, Facebook page, blog and Twitter feed are no longer add-ons to a business’s communication budget: They should be central to its marketing strategy, and used in coordination with other marketing efforts.

People are talking about you in the space. Their chatter will influence your sales, your reputation. Should you be listening in or not? Your prospects are tweeting and posting Facebook updates.

In context of organizational change forced on account of new media, Branson proposes:

Beyond customer service, you may need to consider that the old divisions between advertising, marketing and public relations (PR) have broken down, so it’s time to review how your marketing team works.

This has been the big debate at many organizations. Traditional companies and structures always had things slotted out well, divided amongst different teams and departments. For once, this new thing is not a part of any one single team. Social Media has to pretty much run across the organization, and companies will have to evolve new structures to accommodate this new reality. We are fortunate to work with a couple of large Indian companies who have embraced this new reality, and have responded by finding ways to make Social Media work across the organization.

Branson shares some insights from Virgin:

Virgin Atlantic recently created a Social Relations team to manage the combined media space and to make sure our sites and communications are current and interesting, maintaining the cheeky flair that characterizes the brand.

We have always tried to maximize the impact of our advertising through clever PR, daring stunts and amusing media campaigns.

The rise of social media has presented some exciting challenges to the status quo and caused us to question our usual ways of doing business. When we launched a new global ad for Virgin Atlantic on TV and in theatres—full of humour, fun and with a touch of glamour—the ad also started to generate a big following online, as it was promoted by our fans to their friends. This extended the reach of our ad far beyond our usual audiences.

This is again a very interesting thought, and one which we keep sharing with our clients. Your Social Media outreach has to be consistent with your brand positioning. You cannot be all serious and conservative otherwise, and try to go and have a cool and casual attitude on Social Media. Within the framework of what you stand for, or what people perceive you as, you need to create the Social Media presence. Virgin in that sense, is in a good position. Since it is already associated as a hip and fun brand. And the social media presence extends that positioning.

Finally Branson shares the need for commitment from the top:

To succeed, such efforts must be supported from the top. David Cush, chief executive officer of Virgin America, freed up the management of these channels from the company’s classic hierarchy. His social media team is made up of 20-somethings who have been selected to run the online services. David says they have been given broad guidelines and then let loose.

These employees, who were “born digital”, have placed Facebook and Twitter at the centre of the company’s communication strategy, capturing the Virgin spirit online.

The points shared here have a few clear messages:

a. Recognizing the reality of this new media and its ever growing impact, there is a need for commitment from top management, to this space. As demonstrated by Virgin.

b. Simply because traditional marketers and communication specialists in companies are not grounded into the realities of this new media, it is important to let these be managed by those who “get the space”. Whether it is 20-somethings inside the company, or an agency who can support your endeavors in this space, from the outside.

c. The most critical aspect is to NOT be obsessed about “controlling the communication flow”. CONTROL is a dirty word in the context of Social Media. Remember and understand that you CANNOT control! Once that fact sinks in, let the team assigned to the job for the company, have a reasonably free hand. Conversations will flow, sometimes into areas that are not very comfortable. But the fact that the brand allows that to happen, responds with honesty, and allows its customers to have their say, is what customers are looking for. A brand that really cares to listen, and then respond!

For the CEOs feeling lost in this new world, these final words from Branson should serve as good direction:

To succeed, entrepreneurs and business leaders must look at this rapidly changing world through a different lens; by working with your online sites, services and teams, you can transform these challenges into opportunities.

Yes, the final message to any company, to any CEO, to any CMO or senior manager, who is getting sleepless nights on account of the ever changing world, is to not get overwhelmed. Rather, take a deep breath, get a good team in place or look for an agency who could help you get it right, and then plan out a strategy. And implement it. And convert the challenges to opportunities!

Richard Branson spoke the words from my mouth! But Branson being Branson, I hope the message rings in loud and clear. Although I have been saying the same things, I could have not put it better myself..

Your views? Comments? Please share them herebelow..

Once upon a time life used to be 8×5 …eight hours a day for 5 days a week. For some it would be 8×6, 9×6 or some such combination.

Then Internet came along…and life became 24×7. Internet gurus taught us how our ecommerce store could continue ringing in revenues even while we slept…and with 24×7 revenues, came the need for 24×7 customer service. On the other hand, our bosses gave us laptops with data cards…and we became 24×7 corporate slaves. The concept of time changed completely.  It was no longer neatly bracketed into silos (time to work, time to play, time to sleep, and time to do nothing) … it became one long line…with anything happening anytime.

Let me warn you; all this is set to change, again. For good or for worse I don’t know, but it is going to change be sure.  This is how:

• If I need to get my Dell laptop repaired, I need to either look up their manual for a 1.800 number so that I can call them, or I need to logon to their website, pull out a custserv email id and write them a mail, or I need to fill in a form on their website giving details of the complaint. Right?  … Wrong! No need to do this anymore! (BTW Dell India has one of the worst IVRS….it keeps you on hold endlessly)

• Now all you need to do is logon to twitter and send out a tweet “Having problems with my #Dell laptop. Need help”. Chances are that a Dell representative who is continuously monitoring twitter for tweets with references to Dell, will send you a @ message offering a help. Chances are also that a Lenovo representative (who is tracking competition) will also send you a @ message offering help, even though you are a Dell customer (hoping that Lenovo scores some brownie points with you for helping you out !)

The point is that as a consumer, I no longer need a “definitive” address (phone number, email id, website URL etc.) to reach out to a brand. I can just tweet into cyberspace (even without knowing Dells twitter handle). It is like standing on top of my building’s roof and shouting that I am a Dell customer and I need help… and my expectation is that Dell will hear me and respond!

Social Media will create a huge jump in consumers’ expectations of service levels from a brand. He no longer needs to reach out to the brand. It is his expectation that he can just shout out anytime and from anyplace … and that the onus of listening to him and seeking him out lies on the brand. Brands now need to be truly omnipresent.

Welcome to the new reality: 24x7xEverywhere.

Executive Summary: Is Social Media Monitoring just an academic exercise, or can it lead to concrete benefits to the Brand? We conducted a Monitoring exercise to find out. The chosen domain was iPod and iPhone speakers and docks. To know more about what we found, read on. (Hint: It was the latter)

The method used for conducting this Social Media Monitoring exercise was essentially similar to the previous exercises carried out by us (Online Travel Sector in India and Hybrid Cars – Whats the Social Media Buzz). The study differed however, in that we completely focused on deriving points of action from it. We specifically chose this particular market  (iPhone and iPod docks) to conduct the exercise, because it was very close to another market/domain (iPods and iPhones themselves) which have a very high level of noise. We would have to ensure, therefore, that the search was very well defined, so that the number of irrelevant results retrieved would be kept in check. The entire exercise involved:

1. Identifying the appropriate search terms to enter into the Social Media Monitoring tool, so as to reduce the number of irrelevant results retrieved. (We restricted the searches to retrieve four days worth of data, June 12th to June 15th)
2. Running the searches, and allowing the Software to perform a first level classification of the results.
3. Our Social Media Executives cleaning up the results, to remove all the irrelevant ones.
4. Higher level, intelligent classification, categorization by our Executives.
5. Analyzing these results to extract points of action, and identifying influencers.

Our learning:

If I was a company about to launch an iPod Dock/Speaker system, what would be the features I would ensure that my product had? Apart from the obvious feature, viz. Good Audio output, our monitoring exercise revealed two features which were highly appreciated:

1. Compatibility with different generations of iPhones/iPods: What may seem to be an obvious enough feature, was not present in some models (eg. Bose SoundDock Portable). Conversely, whenever a mention was made of a dock which had this feature, it was highly praised (eg. GenevaSound Medium).
2. Ability to charge your device while music is being played: This feature, as well, wherever present was highly praised (eg. Harmon Kardon Go + Play). Yet, not all systems seem to have this feature.

On Social Media, Issues resurface, constant vigilance is required. The Bose SoundDock Portable, mentioned above, had a problem. Days after the 3G iPhone was released on 11th July 2008, people started talking about issues with the SoundDock Portable. While charging the iPhone 3G, the dock made a popping/clucking sound, every 5 minutes. This was reported on a particular thread on the Apple Support forums. We saw users helping each other, recounting  their interactions with Bose’s support  (which incidentally, did not reply in the thread). The problem was solvable, requiring the users to send the dock to Bose, who would modify it and send it back. As it happens, three new posts was posted on the the same thread, on 15th June 2009 (which is why the tool picked it up).  These people had the same issue, one year later, and still had to help each other solve it.

Action Required:

We identified results, which merited response as ‘Action Required’ results. They were further classified into ‘Action Required: First Level Response’ and ‘Action Required: Escalate to Customer Service’. Within these four days, we found three results on which we determined action would be required, in terms of escalating those three results to Customer Service. They were all related to the Bose SoundDock and problems associated with the same. The first Action Required result was about Bose SoundDock not being able to charge a users iPod Touch. The second and third results were from the apple support forums, with users talking about the popping/clucking sounds being made by the SoundDock Portable.

Influencer Identification:

From among the various sources where iPod docks were spoken about, Social Media Monitoring also helps us identify the influencers, viz. sources with the widest reach. While the largest number of reviews of various iPod docking systems were on the blog Smart Reviews Online, the popularity rating for this particular blog was 2 (out of a maximum possible rating of 10). On the other hand, the blog Geek.com, which did not always talk about iPod docks, had a popularity rating of 10 (highest rating possible). The only talk about iPod docks on geek.com in this time frame was about the passPORT home dock enables the Soundock to charge iPods while playing them. Another big influencer, with a popularity rating of 10 (source with highest reach or popularity) was, unsurprisingly Apple’s support forums, which had a single thread active, with only three posts during this time frame. It became clear, that frequency of posting (which may lead to a particular blog/channel being seen as influential) may not really be the most popular source.

The above study is an illustration of how monitoring Social Media can very clearly be used to derive well defined and specific action steps. It also helps in identifying which are the most influential sources of information about your product or brand.

The categorization done by our analysts, opens up opportunities for some interesting insights. First let us look at what is the ratio of relevant to irrelevant results from the one’s extracted by the tool:

How do users percieve your brand? What are the thoughts, words they associate with your company? We can analyze the themes being touched upon on Social Media, when people are talking about your brand. In this example, we did this themes analysis on the entire set of relevant results, viz. across brands.

In the tag cloud shown above, larger the size of the word/tag, more closely it is associated with the brand (in this case across brands). The above cloud, for example reveals that the word ‘System’ is very closely associated with speakers/docks, something which should be considered while thinking of a branding strategy for your next product. The word ‘dock’ is individually bigger than ‘speaker’, however, the word ‘speakers’ also figures prominently in the tag cloud.

Now that we know the themes being touched, we want to see which domains have the maximum volume of conversations about iPod Docks and Speakers (a reminder, we are doing this study for the four day period from 12th June to 15th June. It can easily be conducted for longer durations, and on an ongoing basis). The most popular domains, which spoke about iPod speakers, were as per the following image:

If we look at the above graph carefully, we see that there are two posts on Craigslist. Which means there is probably a resales market for iPod docks. We classified these posts concerning resale, and now we can see, which brand has the most resale related posts  for the given duration:

These resale related posts were not restricted to Craigslist alone. Done on an ongoing basis, this can help identify the size of the resale market for a particular brand, or even a particular product.

In previous Social Media Monitoring exercises, we have seen some basic data analysis, including Ratio of Tone within brand, Tone analysis related to product etc. As we can see in this post, much more complex and insightful analysis is possible.

Your questions/comments are invited. What other insights would you like to be able to draw from Social Media?

If you wish to download the White Paper for this study (PDF), you can visit the Resources Page on our website.

** There is a website visibility blog series, which is in the working. Meanwhile, pitching in with this post. **

The inspiration for this post comes from some interactions with Indian brand managers, where we got a suggestion that Social Media may not be on their priority, simply because there isn’t enough of their target market, out there, just yet. When we talked about possible brand reputation risks, and suggested that at least a good social media monitoring exercise should fall in place (quoting cases like the Domino’s story, for example), responses suggested that ‘there have been numerous complaints of cockroaches found in Coke bottles, but that has not hurt their sales growth one bit’.

So why are we like this, in India? Why does customer service come low on priority?

I have personally had outstanding experiences with companies like American Express (for lost traveler checks), Southwest Airlines (for last minute change of bookings, etc.), Cort furniture rental (when I had a short 4 month stay in the Bay Area) etc. I have also heard / read stories of other customer-centric brands like Nordstrom.

But ALL of these are from outside India. I cannot think of one outstanding customer service experience that I would like to talk about, in an Indian context (perhaps, Orange County, Coorg might make the cut for me). Considering that I have spent far more time within the country than outside it, this makes for a generally pathetic state of affairs. Why so?

My analysis of reasons why Indian brands are not too concerned about customer service is:

1. There are just too many of us! When you have a bad experience at a restaurant, curse your way out and promise to never step in again, does that impact that restaurant’s business? Not by much. There are new suckers who are willing to try him out, each day, day after day. Think about a mobile phone or mobile service provider problem?! With millions of new users coming in each month, do they feel threatened by the dissatisfaction of a single customer?
2. Our ‘chalta hai’ culture. We accept mediocrity. Of ourselves. And hence of the service we get. We are a service provider (to an internal customer or an external customer) as much as we are a service consumer. And when we are prepared to accept mediocrity of ourselves as a service provider, the same comes back to us as a recipient of service. And in our true ‘chalta hai’ spirit, we accept it!
3. The slow legal system. So the automobile garage short changed you. You can even prove it. What good does that do? You know you do not have the time for the painfully slow courts of law. And other than taking the law in your own hands, you do not have any other resort. So you resign yourself to your bad luck while the garage continues to give shoddy service.
4. The lack of an effective consumer movement. Again, we have a more active consumer protection mechanism than earlier, but for the size of our economy, it is still too little, and too late. There is no serious case of ‘consumer backlash’. Even with the high media attention that the ‘fertilizer in Coke and Pepsi’ case got, I do not believe their sales were dented by much.
5. The lack of a strong, single point media vehicle that can go after these cases. Yes, when it suits them, mainstream media takes up some of the cudgels. But there are always other ‘breaking news’ fighting for the minutes or the column inches, and the brands at fault, just need to wait out the time. On the other hand, there has not emerged in the online space, any strong brand that can just work to take up the cause for the consumers. At least, none with a serious brand recall.
6. The freeloader attitude that many of us have. Why can’t a brand offer “30 days free replacement” in India? The kind that is a par-value service offering in the western worlds? Because it would be a disaster. Unfortunately, coming from a ‘shortage economy’ legacy that we do, we have a tendency to grab whatever is on offer for free. If there is a 30-days free replacement, you would find the longest queues for returning these, on the 29^th day, after using the items for those many days. Likewise, brands may assume that any leeway given in terms of customer service could end up getting abused. In a restaurant that I know, they will not allow on a single table, people having a buffet and a la carte meals. Because they fear that the smaller a la carte ordering folks, will end up sharing the one free unlimited buffet that is ordered! Unfortunate, but true representation of the average Indian L

It is for all these reasons that we do not see brands and companies getting particularly aggressive towards excellent customer service, and we continue to suffer, as consumers.

Moreover it is for these reasons that companies often do not much care about Online Reputation Monitoring, as they figure that it does not matter!

However I strongly believe that brands and companies are missing a trick, as they ignore this Online Reputation monitoring effort, and believe that it does not matter in India.

1. Online memory is longer. While stories that came in the newspapers or on TV are fresh only as long as the stories are alive, online, these stories do not die. They are searchable, they are accessible, and they can haunt you at the least expected moment of time!
2. Snowball effect. What could start as a whimper or one dissatisfied voice, could soon convert into a community of dissatisfied users, and then become a snowball. Dissatisfied customers in Cochin, Mangalore, Patiala, Lucknow, Pune..wherever.. are now connected. By the medium known as Social Media!! And in size, their voice is amplified and the whimper can become a big holler!
3. When social goes mainstream. Domino’s went from YouTube to the New York Times in 3 days. When such transitions happen, God help your brand. You do not really want to wait for that to happen. Stem it while you can, should be the mantra.
4. You may have many customers, but you have few bankers, investors, joint venture partners. Once you slide down the reputation path, and have tons of bad press (well, more like bad ‘web-content’) , then you may just find it getting tougher to get bankers to trust you, to have investors putting in money or giving you a decent valuation, or to get joint venture partners. Because of our population, customers may still come, but margins may go down, as the premium factor disappears!
5. And what about people? Good resources do not want to work with companies having bad reputation. Not when they have a choice. If you choose to ignore the complaints, customers will write, blog, tweet, shout. And these noises will keep good talent away from your company!
6. This can haunt you at the most unexpected and inopportune moment. When you are going for the IPO and your papers are filed, your competitor might just pull out all that dirt from the web and social media archives, and ensure that it gets the maximum visibility. Since content does not disappear here, you always carry this risk!

It should be clear then, that even if you are selling in a seller’s market, reputation matters today! And especially online reputation or reputation being created via Social Media conversations. It is important to monitor Social Media for social chatter about your brand, your competition, your vertical, and be alert on any unusual developments.

Of course, it is critical that the company gets customer focused in the process, and does not allow much customer ire to happen, in the first place. In many cases, these may be a significant cultural change to bring about!

Do you think Social Media will impact our attitude towards customer service? What is your opinion on Social Media’s role as a reputation builder/breaker? Looking forward to a great discussion.

** Social Wavelength offers the service of Social Media monitoring. Social Wavelength will use industry standard software tools to tap all conversations around a brand. This can generate a very large amount of data, though. Our social media executives then work to ‘clean up the data’ and tag the conversations on various parameters, enabling effective and actionable reporting to clients. In cases where brand reputation sensitivity is extremely crucial, Social Wavelength can also offer 24×7 Real Time Online Reputation Monitoring and Reporting. For more information, please email info@socialwavelength.com. **