7 Ways To Build Customer Relationships On Facebook

Until recently, many chief marketing officers were only focused on gathering millions of Facebook fans. The next phase is all about building relationships with them online.

Here are seven ways CMOs can tap their Facebook fan bases for customer relationship management.

1. Build a Single Database

The first stage in managing a relationship with fans, just like with customers, is creating a database of all fans under one roof. It doesn’t matter where the fans are: Facebook, twitter or on your website. You need to manage a data base with all your fans and their activities. This can be done using an open graph which allows interfacing with the API of most social platforms.

2. Prioritize Engagements

Some of the most important questions to ask are: Assuming that we can encourage fans to perform any action, which action by your brand’s fans would you consider most important? Do you want more posts on your page or if you’re the CMO of Cannon perhaps you prefer more photos? Do you want people to spread around your contents? Or perhaps it’s more important for you to attract movement from Facebook to your website? Each of these actions can be measured and a different value can be attributed to each one of them.

3. Identify Your Most Important Fans

Not all fans are equal, and just like a company knows how to identify its top customers, it should also know how to identify its leading social media fans, the ones that are most active, those that perform the activities that you define most important (section 2) and are the most influential. Once you have a database of all your customers (section 1) and their activities, you can now identify your best and most important fans and strategy to reach them.

4. Give Value to Your Fans

Just like in the loyalty program you might offer elsewhere, cultivate one on Facebook. Each of your active fans deserves to get something; it can be a kind word, badge, some recognition, or virtual/actual gift. Once you can identify your top fans and the activities you consider most important, you can create value for them. For example, participating in a game on your social network equals 30 points, inviting a friend equals 50 points, uploading five photos equals a special badge. By initiating this game, you’re now building a loyalty plan for engagement.

5. Tie in Your Other Loyalty Programs

Once you have a loyalty plan for engagement, the last piece in the puzzle is connecting it to your loyalty plan. How cool would it be if your fans could convert virtual points they accumulate by engaging with

your brand into convertible loyalty plan points? For example, if you’re Continental Airlines, 100 Facebook points could equal one mile in the loyalty plan.

6. Communicate the Value You Offer

Communicate the value you offer to each and every one of your fans, define clear terms of use, determine a limit on the number of times they can participate in each engagement, make sure to send them emails with details about the values they have accumulated, such as the number of points or gifts available to them as well as important activities the brand offers. For example; a new game has been opened as part of our summer campaign and participation awards 50 points.

7. Measure Return on Investment

Measure ROI and check if the activities you defined create profits for you. Follow the correlation between fan and customer: Is a fan that is more active a loyal customer? Did a customer that originated from Facebook activity, who convert his or her engagement points, buy more of the organization’s services? For the first time, in this type of world, we can see the connection between a loyal fan and a devoted customer, identify the connection between action on the social network and action at the cash register, allowing us to reward fans and followers with rewards for their participation in social activities.