I remember almost 20 years ago when people were starting to use PDA and later the smartphone, I was very resistant to change. I stuck to my faithful Nokia GSM phone for voice and SMS communication. Back then, there were no Facebook or social media chat. The main communication platform was email. My excuse was I don’t want email to chase after me 24×7.
Lo and behold, it came a time where technology revolution forced me either to move with the trend or get left behind. And of course, the only new phone I could get when changing my phone was a smart phone which left me no choice.
How life has changed since then. How our lives today are so much evolved around technology, especially the internet. Many aspects of our daily lives are dependent on the internet, especially the younger generations that grew up with it. Businesses are no different. In fact, many businesses today rely heavily on internet to conduct their business.
The birth of social media platforms which started with the purpose of helping people to connect socially has evolved over the years from a mere social networking platform to become a new and power marketing channel to reach a worldwide audience and elevate customer engagement. With the billions of social media users, businesses can’t afford to ignore this media channel in their marketing strategy.
Below diagram gives an indication on the active user size (in millions) of the different platforms.
Social messaging platforms has become a key component in customer engagement strategy.
Because of its convenience, instantaneous and direct, customers have largely preferred to talk to businesses via messaging platforms rather than voice call. Businesses need to consider the follow facts to recognize the power of messaging platforms.
- Messaging is hugely popular and there are multiple platforms of choice
- Messaging is personal and customers like to receive personal treatment
- Messaging is engaging and intuitive with emotive icons to express feelings
- Messaging allows time to think through in the engaging process
- Messaging is immediate and real time. Customers nowadays want instant feedback.
The challenge is businesses need to have a reliable consolidated channel that enable them to communicate with multiple social media platforms. ORENcloud has launched this new service, ORENomni (https://www.orencloud.com/omni) to enable our subscribers to have an effective single platform customer engagement channel to communicate with their customers, regardless what platform their customers are using.
So, what is your company’s marketing and customer engagement strategy as far as social media channels is concern? It is hard to ignore when there are literally millions and millions on social media platforms everyday.
