Tips and advice for those who wish to present a reputable brand via social media

Like most people, Dorian Hedy Mekni understands that an enterprise’s success is dependent on its reputation. As a successful businessman himself, whose own professional information can be found on Flickr, he is keenly aware of the role that social media plays in maintaining a brand’s positive public image. Here, we’ll be discussing some of the most effective ways to use social media to enhance a business’s standing amongst its customer base.

The first, and perhaps the most important thing to note is that social media is designed to help people connect with one another; and so, whilst your ultimate goal in setting up Twitter and Facebook accounts may be to promote your business and increase sales, you must focus on establishing relationships with both your existing and potential customers. It’s vital to interact with them, and spend time getting to know who them as individuals. This can be achieved in a number of different ways, but the key is to ensure that you are present in the communities that your customers frequent. This could be a specific group on Facebook, or regular online ‘meetings’ on Twitter, where people use a hashtag to discuss a particular topic.

Although it might be difficult to resist, it’s best to avoid ‘hard selling’ when using social media. Even customers who love your goods or services are unlikely to enjoy tweets about your latest product. Remember, the purpose of the content on your social media accounts is to help you build a strong connection with your customer base, not to sell your wares. When it comes to providing valuable content on social media, aim to give 80% more than you receive. This means than no more than 20% of your time on Twitter, Facebook and Google Plus should be devoted to self-promotional conversations. This approach will lead to organic growth which is both consistent and sustainable.

Producing content which is interesting and relevant will help you to gain the trust and respect of your target demographic. Rather than making your brand the central focus all of the time, try to serve as a source of interesting information and light entertainment. Be creative, in terms of the type of content that you choose to share on a daily basis; you may, for example, want to include things such as infographics, sweepstakes, competitions, videos and apps. Make sure that you grab opportunities to showcase your expertise too; you can do this by, for example, sharing a link to a blog post you or your staff have composed, or an article you have written for another online publication. Try to produce and share content which is not only informative, but also valuable to your customers; if it’s useful to them, they’re much more likely to share it with their followers.

Being appreciative of those you interact with is also important if you want to make a good impression. Always thank those who ‘retweet’, ‘favourite’ or share your posts, as they’re doing you a favour by spreading the word about your brand. A simple ‘thank you’ will let them know that you appreciate the effort, and may even encourage them to share your content again in the future.

Regardless of how respectful you are of your audience, it’s inevitable that you will have to deal with customer complaints via social media, at one point or another. Instead of viewing this is as a problem however, try to look at it as an opportunity to improve your brand’s reputation. If dealt with the issue head on, in a polite and helpful manner, complaints made on these platforms can be transformed into positive testimonials.

If you spot a tweet or a Facebook comment from an unhappy customer, it’s always best to address the issue immediately. Under no circumstances should you block them, or delete their comment, as this will almost certainly aggravate the situation further, and may even lead to them complaining about your business on another online community. Keep in mind that your response will remain on the internet permanently, and will either contribute to, or detract from your standing as a reputable brand. Keep the tone of your reply pleasant and positive, and always do whatever you can to rectify the problem. On social media, the traditional rules of professional interaction can be bent slightly, and in fact, many brands fare best when they respond to customer issues in a more playful and personable manner.

Whilst projecting the best image of your brand online can be both challenging and time-consuming, there’s no doubt that this task is worth the effort; when used with care, social media can serve as a highly effective tool in developing and maintaining your business’s reputation.

Become a benchmark brand

Entrepreneur Dorian Hedy Mekni knows that branding plays a hugely important role in the success of any business. Whether your company is product based or service based, it will benefit from establishing a strong, identifiable image, a brand philosophy and a reputation which can be relied on to carry it through the more difficult stages of business marketing and success.

However, in order to really stand out you need to be the benchmark from which all other suppliers are measured. Increasingly, this is becoming the requirement rather than the ideal as we try to recover from a double-dip recession and the consumer market remains as fierce and competitive as it is today. These days it is not enough to expect your consumer to remain loyal when competition is so high, online reviews are unavoidable and the opportunity for consumers to self-research on the internet is rife. So, how do you achieve the benchmark brand status?

The first step to establishing the winning formula is to make your brand stand out from the crowd; help it to get noticed. Businessman Dorian Hedy Mekni doesn’t take this to mean adopting a one way push model in which the consumer market is inundated with promotional information about your brand. Such approaches will only take you so far. To attract the kind of attention which will entice customers and rouse interest, consumers must resonate with your brand on a much more emotional level. It is an emotional familiarity between consumer and brand that will establish true customer loyalty.

Several months back, Adweek published an interesting article which listed ‘The 100 Most Loved Companies’. Needless to say, the brands which made the list were all well-established, hugely successful brands with fantastic marketing approaches. However, they were also much more friendly, familiar and familial than those brands you would expect to see on a similar ‘Top 100’ Forbes list. Brands like The Walt Disney Company, Hershey’s, SC Johnson and Kellogg’s all rated higher than arguably more successful brands like Coca Cola.

Engaging with your consumer is essential for even the most basic of marketing exercises, but it is the forming of an emotional relationship between consumer and brand which will make all the difference and transport you from default brand to the much coveted benchmark brand.