This post has the objective of evoking more questions and comments than answers!
I am a dedicated and active supporter of social media both personally and professionally. However recently, I had reason to pause when I received a friend request to my Facebook page by a favorite client. A customer wants to be my friend? If I accept, will he view all the photos of me and my dog and think my obsessions are a little strange? If I don’t accept, surely he would be insulted? What would happen when I advise “not available to work on Monday”, but then he views my recently posted photos of my golf long- weekend? My conundrum lasted only a few minutes, he is a great client, we have common interests outside of our work lives and I realized he was the kind of person I would be a friend with anyway!
However, since the friend request, I have been consumed with the idea of how deep should our relationships with our customers actually be? I have been researching, analyzing and studying trends, collating information to determine my own point of view. Jack and Suzy Welch talk about the importance of being sticky at Welchway.com, not the website stickiness but the customer retention and loyalty stickiness. As Jack and Suzy explain, companies are paying “lip service” to the idea of deeper, genuine relationships with their customers, but do they really execute on those ideas?
An announcement in the press this past week was the introduction of a “personal” blog from Sergey Brin. A surprise for the industry, considering how guarded Google Co-founders are with their own lives outside of Googleplex. Is this a marketing initiative to demonstrate a personable and human side to their customers? Is the raw honesty real and genuine?
So rather than a point of view; what are the guidelines today for our digital relationships with our customers, should boundaries be determined by product or company or industry or culture or demographic? Or case by case, customer by customer? We can only assume the depth and breadth of online relationship management between our car manufacturer and the developer of our daily medication is different!
What should our Instant Messenger campaigns directed at our customers look and feel like? C’mon X and Y Generation – the era of open, 24/7 and transparent communicators – what do you prefer as a consumer?
Great post! I was just contemplating this issue earlier this week when I saw numerous co-workers who had not asked me to be their “friend” on FaceBook and MySpace. I wondered … hmmm, why are they friends with this co-worker and not this one…
Then I almost felt voyeuristic even looking at their pages!
With LinkedIn, you can see who views your profile. Now I wonder why certain people are stalking ME!
I also wondered about listing my clients on my LinkedIn page … will that be a good thing or a bad thing if they see who my other clients are? And will they think that me being in a band is a cool thing or not acceptable to moonlight on the job?
Ahhh … Social media is intriguing …
It’s like dating.
You want to make a good impressions because you don’t know who is watching, or what your date is thinking of you.
You stay on your best behavior, look your best and wait to see if your enthusiasm is reciprocated.
Then, once you cross the dating line into “relationship” you put on the baggy sweats, let your hair down and go fresh-faced.
It’s a comfort zone.
As long as you and your clients are in a comfy relationship, why not let your hair down?
Just keep the table-dancing happy hour pictured in a separate photo album that only your best friends can access
I do believe that transparency is a good thing. Technically, I’m Generation X, but I sometimes relate to the social media tendencies of Y. I have no problem having my clients know about me and my life, as long as they share in return. If they ask to be my friend, that means I get access to them and understand them as people even more. I love twitter for this reason – share a little or a lot, but it becomes second-nature and fun. I have reconnected with offline friends through online media, and I think that’s the true power of it! Great post! (Oh, and follow me on Twitter if you’d like: http://twitter.com/jeanniecw)
LOVE this post!! I attended the Blog World Conference and this blending of business and personal relationships was a constant thought of mine, the entire time I was there.
I get social media and am totally intrigued by the possibilities that it presents, as a marketing strategy. However, I’m not convinced that a total transparency is required in order to establish a good-natured, working relationship with your clients.
I’m one who believes in boundaries…everyone has their place. Is it important for me to allow my clients a peep-hole look into my personal life, so that they can understand who I am and the things outside of work that are important to me…Yes. Is it important for my clients to know that I have a birthmark on my left elbow and my youngest who’s almost 4 still isn’t potty trained…No. While this is an exaggeration of the truth, I’m just trying to make a point that we can be personally connected with our clients and friends that we make out in cyber-space but we don’t need to be intimately connected with them. Because we share so much of ourselves on our Facebook and MySpace networks, I think a choice should be made whether it’s going to be for personal or professional reasons. This allows us to control the perception that others have of who we are.
One of the speakers at the conference made a statement that stuck with me “Perception trumps reality 100% of the time.” So, if this is true, do you really want to run the risk of clouding a client’s professional perception of you, by allowing them into your reality?? We have to remember that who we are at home is typically very different than who we are at work.
Linda, Jeannie and Tarina,
Thanks so much for taking the time to both read and provide your own perspective/exerience into our “social” lives. Linda, your parallel with the dating game had me laughing out loud, Jeannie thanks for the Twitter invitation, you have reminded me to start my investigation into micro-blogging and Tarina you have prompted me to coin a new term for CRM – cloudy transparency! See you online! AJ
What great perspectives from Amanda and in the comments. I’m torn on this one- I can see both sides of the arena. I guess my final thought has always been don’t put anything on the Internet you wouldn’t want your Grandma to see. The Internet is public, even with privacy settings.
Tarina- I love the quote- “Perception trumps reality 100% of the time.”