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Hug Your Haters: What’s Changed In One Year?

Authors: Jay Baer Jay Baer
Posted Under: Social Media
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Marketing and customer service continue to converge. Learn how the trends I uncovered in Hug Your Haters have changed, one year later.

Takeaways

  • Today’s biggest customer service trend is live video.
  • Companies like Birchbox and Southwest Airlines are already using live video in fascinating ways.
  • The all-new Convince & Convert ON newsletter has arrived!

Jay: Marketing and customer service continue to converge.

Hey everybody, I am Jay Baer, President of Convince & Convert. Thanks so much for being part of the Convince & Convert ON email newsletter. Each issue we’re gonna do a short video like this, talk about trends that the team and I see in marketing, customer service, and related topics. Things that you need to know and be on top of.

Today, I want to talk about the fact that marketing and customer service continue to collide and intersect in ways that are very, very important. I wrote a book about this a year ago called Hug Your Haters, which really documented the rise of customer service as a spectator sport. In the research we did for the book, we found that about 40% of customers interact with brands in public forums like Twitter, Facebook, ratings and reviews sites, Yelp, Trip Advisor, et cetera, and discussion boards and forums. And that percentage continues to increase because people realize that in some cases they get better treatment in social media and it’s actually just easier to interact with somebody in that format as opposed to call or email.

But now, we’re seeing even greater intersections between marketing and customer service. And what’s one of the biggest trends in marketing and the last 12 to 18 months? Live video.

Now, we’re starting to see live video used as a customer service initiative in really interesting ways. Two examples. One, Birchbox, the monthly beauty delivery service does a Facebook Live videos on a regular basis across a whole series of countries. And it’s a combination of customer service, research and development, and marketing. They get on there and they interact with their customers in real time. Talk about what’s in the box, what customers would like to have in future boxes, answer questions, it’s really a terrific example. You can see a link to it down there.

Also, you may remember a few months ago Southwest Airlines had a major crisis. Their whole computer system went down. Thousands and thousands of flights were canceled. It was a real mess. And of course they went to Twitter and Facebook and their blog, et cetera, and told people what was happening and did the best they could. But the other thing that Southwest did in that scenario was really fascinating. They did a Facebook Live video and they took their actual Chief Operating Officer, just put an iPhone in his face. It wasn’t even on a tripod. And he just talked into the phone and said, “Hey guys, we’re really sorry we screwed up. Here’s what we’re gonna do next and we apologize, and here’s who to call and what to do.” So, this is a major American corporation using Facebook Live video in a social media crisis scenario. A convergence of a marketing tool, live video, with a customer service scenario.

We’re gonna see more of that. What I want you to do is start thinking about how this convergence of marketing and customer service impacts you and your business. In particular, how you might be able to use live video as a customer service tool. A bunch more resources underneath there that you might like. I hope you check it out. Some resources from us at Convince & Convert, others from around the web. I’m glad that you’re on the Convince & Convert ON email list. If there’s anything the team and I could ever do for you just reply to the email and let us know.

Thanks so much, I’m Jay Baer.

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