Engaging with a prospective customer is probably the most crucial step in making a successful sale. The interactive nature of social media easily lends itself to the engagement between a business and their prospects. Social networks help foster trust between the parties, while speeding up the final sale process either online or in person.
How Social Media Helps Engage Prospects:
1. Social Media Puts Brands With the People
It is key for businesses without a social media presence to remember this fact: their absence from consumer’s decision-making processes on this medium means that they are not present in the decision itself. People are making their buying decisions increasingly based on the information gleaned from social media outlets. This information can come from brands directly, recommendations and word of mouth from friends, or viral material that spins up to them. A brand must be present to be part of the mix. It is expected by the vast majority of people that a company is active on social media networks. Companies lacking a presence are often deemed irrelevant.
2. Social Engagement Leads to Customers
Your company’s prospects are on social media looking for information about various products and services. By way of Google searches, they are being led to social media. A study by the market researchers Chadwick Martin Bailey, with the help of iModerate Research Technologies, found that 60% of people whom “Like” brand pages on Facebook will recommend those companies to friends. On Twitter, the figure is even higher at 79%. Even more important than those figures are the conversion numbers found by this survey. A majority on Facebook (51%) are more likely to buy from a brands they “Like”. Once again, on Twitter the figure is an amazing 67%. Considering the massive numbers of people using those networks, the business potential is more than obvious.
3. Engagement
Brands must follow through on social media with their customers and prospects. No business should create a Facebook page and Twitter account and forget about them. A brand that thinks their presence on social networks involves setting up a static advertisement page that changes from time to time, are in for rude awakening. People expect brands to interactively engage with them across social media networks. Companies who don’t engage appear out of touch with their own market.
Companies that make the effort to not only embrace, but also actively engage with their audience on social media networks, are reaping the benefits of converting prospects into paying customers.
Written and produced in beautiful Naples, Florida by OnFast.com. Visit OnFast.com today to get your free trial subscription to our Social Media Marketing Service.
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