Scott Stratten, with a study of over 1,000 business owners created what he called The Hierarchy of Buying. Using this hierarchy as well as the new tools provided by social media, Stratten believes you can transform your business.
Becoming a Recognized Expert
What is a recognized expert? This is the middle of the hierarchy. It’s when you’ve made a name for yourself, and the people in your industry turn to you for advice. Because you are consistently helpful to them, eventually some of them move up the pyramid and strike up a relationship with you before they have a need to buy.
How do you use social media for this? First, you need to be good at what you do and have loads of experience. Once you meet both of those requirements you can follow the three steps laid out by Stratten.
- Create traction. To create traction, consistency is critical. Spending 15 minutes a day practicing is better than 2 hours on the weekend, you should be carving out time in your schedule like this on a daily basis. When Stratten was in this phase he tweeted 7,000 times. It may not be necessary to go quite to that extreme but the idea is that you are focusing on your goal.
2. Build momentum. Once you begin getting things out of social media that you hoped, you need to begin to build your momentum. You need to use your social media presence effectively. The goal is to get exactly what you hoped out of your social media presence.
3. Expand your platform. Once you have built your momentum you can begin to scale back your focus on a single platform. Continue to maintain your presence on that platform while switching your main focus to growing a new platform.
Following these steps by Stratten will have you well on your way to becoming a recognized expert on social media.
How to use social media with current satisfied customers
At the top of the hierarchy of buying pyramid are currently satisfied customers. Many people are already aware that it takes a lot more money to acquire new customers than to keep a current customer. With social media, it is a whole lot easier to figure out what makes your customers happy. All you have to do is “listen” to the conversations on social media. One way to do this is to follow the lead of Tufts University when a student ate a rotten apple in one of the campus dining halls. They responded with an apology, as well as provided more information as to how they can follow up and make the situation right.
With the use of social media you can often look better for cleaning up a bad experience than if that experience had never happened at all. Bad experiences are bound to happen. Master the art of turning disgruntled customers into raving fans and you’ll keep your customers forever.