Lauren McMullen asked:




Social Media Marketing is built on the foundation of first creating a relationship with people and then transitioning those people into clients after they learn to know like and trust you. If problems arise it is very important to remember that the relationship must always come first or the customer will feel duped.

When someone becomes upset about a product or service you provided and they call you to discuss the problem you have 2 choices. You can honor your refund policy with grace, dignity and respect and thus maintain the relationship between you and your customer or you can make the customer squirm and feel like they have done something wrong because they are dissatisfied and then honor the refund policy.

It is amazing to me that anyone would pick the second choice when they are only shooting themselves in the foot but after interviewing many people I have found out it happens all the time. Why would you try to make them feel like a failure? Everyone HATES to feel like a failure and once they do they NEVER want to put in that position again so that means they won’t ever be calling you again.
Now you might say good riddance if you feel like they were unreasonable but the fact of the matter is, you have a lot more to lose than one client. You have all their friends and family to lose as well and remember because of the Internet they have a lot more friends than they used to. Potentially thousands on Facebook and Twitter.

These are my recommendations for handling these sticky situations with grace and integrity. Maybe when it happens to you, you will be able to turn this potentially difficult situation into a positive one for your company.

Respond as quickly as humanly possible to any complaints. Sometimes that’s all that it takes to prevent the need for a refund. Even if you feel like you have provided the best possibly service maybe your systems failed for this client. Always assume they are right.
Do what you say you will do – If you promise to be available for a call BE AVAILABLE, if you make an appointment to talk KEEP THE APPOINTMENT. In other words treat the client with the same respect that you would like to receive.
Apologize for the problems and accept complete responsibility. Trust me your client will be able to tell when you are faking the concern so you must truly believe what you are saying.
Offer to make it right. Do what is necessary to alleviate the problem and ask the all important question, what can I do to make you feel good about this? Can I fix the problem?
If the answer is no, accept the fact that trust has been irreparably damaged and don’t blame the client for their feelings. Accept their decision with gracefully and quickly offer the promised refund.
If appropriate, you might ask the client to tell you what they might have done differently so that this problem would not be an issue for future clients. Again your attitude is so important here. They will feel your intention so if you can’t do this without tying to transfer blame to the client skip this step because you will do more harm than good.
Follow through immediately and process the refund ASAP If you follow all the steps outlined above there is a very good chance that the client will continue to feel good about you and your products or services and they still might refer others to you in the future. Later they might actually acknowledge that the reason this did not work out was really no one’s fault but only because the timing was off for both of you.

Social Media has given everyone an equal voice in the market and it has made our huge world small again. Word does get around at the speed of light so how you respond to complaints is more important than ever.

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Christopher G. Wilson asked:

One of the best ways to marketing your products and services online is through social media marketing. Its easy to get lost in all the various personalized methods of marketing, especially in local online marketing.

To get a feel of the local pulse and how they feel about your products and services, your business should use social media. When doing strategic local marketing, you should make use of social media will give you a chance to keep in touch with members of your community.

If the term social media seems a wee bit unfamiliar to you, then how about blogging, Facebook or Twitter? Join the hundreds of community journalists who make their presence felt in their communities through blogging. The only difference is that you will be blogging not only to interact with your community, but also to share with them important information about your business, which will respond to a particular need in the community.

A growing part of our online necessities is social media marketing. Many companies have joined the bandwagon and created fan pages in sites like Facebook.

The reason why social networking sites are effective is the fact that people who befriend you or follow you actually do so willingly. This is an indication that they are interested in your business, and that they could be future customers.

Social networking can be a successful tool when looking to increase strategic local marketing. It doesn’t take much effort or cost to get your business set up with a social networking site. You will be surprised on how quickly you gain “fans” or “followers” of your companies site. You can also target your markets by age, sex, interests, geographic and more.

To get higher ranking in the search engines, and to drive more traffic to your site, social media marketing will help you gain leads without having to spend extra money.

It cost almost nothing (other than a bit of time) to promote your business through social networking. You can definitely hire others for relatively low costs to setup and manage your social media sites if your time is spent better elsewhere in your business.

A company should be responding to a customers need, and the best way to determine those needs (whether its products or services) is through social media marketing. This is a great way to build your business brand that is targeting a specific community.

By using the various social networking sites, it will easier for you to respond to queries about your business, It is also easier to increase brand awareness, build a stronger reputation, and combat any negative issues being hurled against the business.

To better build your online branding and your Local branding, you will need the help of social networks. Tapping into these networks will not only gain greater access to potential customers in Local, but in other parts of the globe and into a market that may be bigger than your imagination.

Beer Brewing 101

Layn asked:

Other than typical social media tips, like facebook or affiliate marketing on forums o blogs. Doesn’t have to be necessarily online.

Its for an advertising of a new branch of an already popular pub & restaurant.

Beer Crafting

anon asked:

“I have just started a new personal business for woman’s community. we have a large quantity of cosmetics products but I don’t know how to market and promote..does it work to use facebook for marketing purpose I wanna know about
The most important aspect of any social media effort and How to use Facebook to expand my business”

Beer Brewing 101