It's a brand new year, and B2B marketers should start it off on the right foot by building their products' good reputations. Here are three things you can do now to ensure that your product or service enjoys a prosperous 2013.
Turn customers into evangelists. Take a look at your list of satisfied customers, and view each as an opportunity to boost the reputation of your product or service. Shoot an email out to everyone on the list asking them to provide feedback and reviews on your site or on review sites for SMBs or big businesses. If you don't feel comfortable requesting reviews outright, consider encouraging feedback by including a link to your review page in your email signature and on your website. (Making sure your customers have easy access to your review page is a good idea regardless.)
Of course, not all your customers will give you a five-star review, no matter how amazing your service or product is. But you should still try and view each review as a win. If it's not a 100 percent rave review, take the comment as constructive criticism, and use it to improve your service or product. People like seeing that their comments are read and addressed.
Don't just listen to the conversation -- join the discussion. Though 71 percent of B2B companies with listening tools use them for market research, and 66 percent use them for brand tracking, only 40 percent use them for influencer marketing, according to Forrester. Review sites aren't one-way venues. They are interactive sites that allow for communication between users and vendors. It's important that you recognize and respect the efforts and opinions of your users by responding to their reviews -- both positive and negative.
Though the prospect of negative reviews can be scary, they shouldn't be; 80 percent of online reviews are four or five stars, according to research from Google. And negative reviews can be addressed. Letting a reviewer know that you fixed a bug, for example, can take the edge off an otherwise scathing review. When you respond to client reviews, you're letting people know that their opinions matter.
Deliver stellar service and high-quality products. Even the most praiseworthy reviews and the best PR won't be able to boost your reputation if your product is faulty or your service is lacking. The most important thing you can do to receive positive feedback is to deliver the best product and service and the most impressive customer support possible. Being great is the only way you'll gain recognition for being great.
Are you ready to boost you're product's image and earn the winning reputation your company deserves? Use your client reviews as a jumping-off point for improvements, publicity, and increased user-vendor communication, and you'll be in prime condition to enter 2013 on the right foot.
Russell, I agree. You need to know not only where the conversations are taking place, but where the influencers and advocates are joining the conversations, and in the B2B space that may well be blogs or forums rather than Twitter.
Russel: That is the risk you have to pay when you depend totally on social media. I guess we still cant move to that level since the social media we do have are not professional enough.
Ha ha good point Mr. Roques. Yes exactly you have a very good point. You need to make customers feel that you are willing to listen to any commewnt they say. It makes them feel that you pay special attention to them.
The problem with relying too heavily on listening platforms for B2B marketing is that these systems are very twitter-centric whereas in many cases the B2B discussions are happening off-twitter, in review sites, message boards, etc. You may be listening to the wrong things...
Well, start off with #3. Although we all know that issues will come, no matter what.
Even with consumer relationships, I've seen how businesses that make an extra effort to ask about issues (after a negative review) make customers feel important and at least with me, stop spreading any bad reviews about the product.
Well point 1 and 3 are clear and sounds really good but point 2 , how do you join a conversation without listening ? If that happens you have no idea on what you will be joining into. I think this is something which happens currently and a very common mistake many do make. That is why many fail.
You must expect some bad reviews. It is how the store responds to those bad reviews which can make the difference. As long as there arn't to many negative reviews that is.
Smart businesses know that a few bad reviews just make the overall review process look more legitimate. Smart customers who see 100% good reviews will suspect that all of the reviewers are ringers for the business.
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