Episode 011: Improve Online Reputation Management with Social Media Bots

In today’s episode of the Conversational Messaging Podcast, Gupshup’s Product Head of Conversational AI, Niyati Agarwal joins Srini to discuss how smart social media bots can bring your brand closer to consumers. Tune in to find out about how this strategy builds customer loyalty, increases sales, and even becomes a marketing tool for your brand! 

Engaging to Consumers Online

Social media is so widely used these days that it has become an outlet for thousands of annoyed (sometimes satisfied) customers. When consumers are unhappy with a product, they tend to voice out their concerns online, the same way they leave positive reviews online when they feel otherwise. Hence, now is the perfect time for brands to incorporate social media bots and automation in their online engagement with consumers. 

“You allow that platform on a private channel to voice out the same kind of concerns that he or she might have done on a public channel.” - Niyati Agarwal

Getting Your Customers’ Loyalty

Social media bots and automation allow consumers to be heard instantly—not thirty minutes or an hour after their feedback, but instantly. This should greatly impact how consumers feel; a very mad customer can at least be turned into a neutral one. The goal is instead of having actual people to monitor this pile of public consumer feedback, which is almost impossible, customers can privately reach out to smart social media bots and be presented with a deal, offer, or resolution that would leave them satisfied and with a renewed loyalty for the brand. 

“You're not able to just handle the negative situations, you're able to handle the positive sentiments of such people. And you're creating a strategy that includes the overall engagement of your users.”  - Niyati Agarwal

Smart Social Media Bots

What brands need to keep in mind is that the success of social media bots depends on how deep the context bots can perceive. If the bot is programmed right and is smart enough to determine what a consumer needs, a consumer who is simply engaging online to leave feedback can be led to making another purchase. Social media bots can definitely establish a deeper connection between brands and consumers that is beneficial for both sides in the long run. 

“I think this is a solution that can really bring brands and followers closer, which is what conversational messaging does.” - Srinivas Vijayaraghavan

To know more about Improving Your Online Reputation Management with Social Media Bots, listen to this episode.

Bio:

Niyati Agarwal

Gupshup’s Product Management Head for AI

Srinivas has over 2 decades of experience in running marketing for high-growth technology companies and managing corporate marketing, product marketing and demand generation. Prior to Gupshup, he held marketing leadership positions with Qubole, Pluralsight, Mobileum and Tejas Networks.

Resources:

Gupshup.io

Transcript

00:01

Listen to insights on how conversational messaging is changing the way businesses and their customers engage. Join gupshup CEO Beerud and VP for marketing srini, and an array of guests for conversations about conversations. This is the Gupshup conversational messaging podcast.

00:25

Hello, and welcome to another episode of the conversational messaging podcast. This is Srini. In season two. As you might have seen in the previous episodes, we have focused more on the the innovations are the product innovations in particular, that conversational messaging is throwing out into different verticals and different sectors. And each of these products are game changers in the way brands engage with customers. So we've spoken about Instagram, and how the messenger API for Instagram is helping brands and followers come closer together, we spoke about one click will pay where you know, payment reminders can get translated into payment conversations and actually payment completions. And today, we'll talk about another very important and sort of very vigorous trend that we see on in the way we all follow brands on social media and we want to interact with them. And to talk about this, I want to welcome back to the show Niyati. Niyati was with us in season one when we spoke about conversational AI, and she heads AI products at gupshup. So Niyati, welcome again to the show 

01:36 

Hi, Srini, welcome everyone. 

01:39 

So Niyati, what we're going to talk about today is in the realm of social media, it's it's an area that all of us are familiar with all of us are on our on social. And we do follow a lot of individuals and we follow a lot of brands on social. So one of the things that we tend to do on social is to usually air our frustrations, especially when it comes to brands, right.So if you buy a product you don't like or if you spoken to someone in customer service. So as it helped you, you use social media to put your frustrations out of feedback out. And your attention and of doing it as one is okay, you feel like you feel empowered, because you're giving that feedback. And you also feel that that feedback might help others. It's like a cautionary tale. For others to see that, you know, you might face the same problem. But at the same time, the end objective is probably to get the brand to notice what's happening and take corrective action. Now, that doesn't happen a lot. Because you know, if brands have millions of followers, they probably get 1000s, or hundreds of 1000s of comments every day. And not all of them are negative, some of them are positive as well. So but it's humanly impossible for brands to look at each and every comment and act on each and every comment. So is that your observation as well? And and how do you see sort of AI and conversational AI playing a role in changing this situation?

03:02

No, actually, you're absolutely correct. And I'm also guilty of doing the same thing. I've also been on Facebook, and you're on Twitter, and nowadays on Instagram as well complaining that my order has not reached me or you know, this is not the kind of service that I was expecting. And that. And I think there are certain very few times when I go and appreciate a brand also there because it typically, you know, there's no other channel to do so. Because you don't want to go to customer support and say that, you know, I liked your product, or maybe I really liked the offer that you gave me last time. So this has become a good channel for people to voice our concerns. That's correct. But what we also need is, you know, some way like you just mentioned some personalized direct one on one conversation that a brand can have with the users and especially with users who engage on social media channels, which is why you know, we have these social bots, we have bought on Instagram, Facebook, or on any other social media channels as well. But they're also there is always the need for the customer or the user to find your brand. And then dm you or you know, send you the first kind of a message. What we need today is also to reach out to users who may be like commenting on your post, or maybe you know, they just like to reply to your Instagram stories, or they just like to put a post on Facebook page saying that, you know, I like your product. I did not like your product or anything on that notion. I'll give you you know, a scenario. Let's imagine there is a brand you know, there's a business and you've written about some product that you're just launching, you know, it's a happy occasion for you. You're doing a lot of content marketing, let's go on Facebook. And there's this user who comes in and says, I did not like your product or you know your services do not code and of course a lot of hard words there. Typically what happens is after that somebody from your team will reach out and say okay, we Looking into it, or you know, some standard response will get back to you, that just aggravates the situation, and then you're not able to solve it in a more personalized manner. And I think right now is where the bots or the conversation AI makes a difference, because First, you need to evaluate the kind of comment that has been made, it's not same standard reply that you can send to everybody, there has to be different conversations, different conversation threads that can be initiated, and then you need to reach out to your user instantly. I mean, 30 minutes later, or an hour later, if you send the same message, they, it does not have the same kind of value, which we'll have in, let's say, in the next second, or the next two seconds. So I am talking about a scenario where let's say the same user commented something negative. And you got a message instantly on a public channel, saying that, you know, I'm really sorry that you had to face this issue, I understand that this product might have raised an issue for you, let me see what we can do, let's take it offline. And, again, on a private dm on Facebook, you will receive the same message saying that I heard your response. And I'm here to help you. And here is how I can help you. And the way that you convert an unhappy user into at least a neutral one. And then you allow that platform on a private channel, to voice out the same kind of concerns that he or she might have done on let's say, a public channel, for instance. And, you know, the bot talks to the person understands the situation finds the right kind of reply, it could be, you know, solving the issue instantly, which, of course, you know, mostly does not happen. But it could even be, let's say integrating a deep net integration with your ticketing system with your support channels, creating a ticket and showing the user that I've done something for you. And we'll make sure that you know, your issue is resolved. And then again, aggravating that situation and expanding it and understanding it. where let's say, I as a user was facing the same issue, I would want an escalation of this metric. And of course, along with that, I would want a resolution to it instantly. And then if you come and ask me, okay, give me a good feedback about your brand. I will most probably do that, because you're happy with the kind of response that I've got. And here's the whole strategy that you know, we need to change.

07:22

Exactly, I think you made several pertinent points, I think, what is empathy, empathy with the followers, scenario, whatever the experience has been good or bad, and the demonstration of that empathy, you know, in a one to one conversation at scale. So I think what you're saying is that it's not just one person that you're responding to your, let's say, you get 100,000 people, let's say you're a large telecom operator across India, and 100,000 people in a day are giving you some kind of feedback on your social channels, you're talking about one on one conversations with each and every one of them, which is triggered by that particular feedback, which is very personalized, right? That's the scenario. That's the vision that you're painting.

08:03

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, nobody, none of the brands can do this manually. I mean, you can have a big team to do this. But automation is the key, which can help situations and which can help you do this with scale with empathy with personalization, and with context as well. I mean, it could not be like the first situation for the user to come to you. It could be that the user comes to you, let's say a second or the third time and says, You know, I have reached out to you in the past, and I've got no resolution, that is the time that you need automation to creep in, you need to understand where exactly was this user, when he made the first response? Or the second response? Or what happened with the back end, all of that data you've already got, you just have a front face to it, so that the bot can pick that context and reply with a more cost lies and more customized response to the user.

08:58

Right? So let's go deeper into maybe a few scenarios where you see this, I know that you've been in the middle of implementing this solution for a lot of our customers. So maybe you can maybe walk us through some some common scenarios that customers typically for. So for any listeners listening out there, who were possibly part of brands that have a huge followership on social. What are some of the maybe two three scenarios that you can walk us through in terms of how this social bot can sort of make a difference?

09:27

We are actually implementing that the whole social media bots strategy. I mean, what we typically say is that, you know, you already have a social media strategy when it comes to marketing. When it comes to content, we need you to include bots, also to the strategy so that we can complete the whole holistic solution across this. So I'll give you situations and scenarios that we're working on with you. No one is customer support. Of course, like we just discussed, that is one of the frequent things that you like to do on social media. So that's one, the other that we talk about. more frequently nowadays is the reputation handling. So that's very important for brands to kind of reach out to the users in a more positive way. And for the users to realize that the brand cares for them. And you know, the brand is there to hear to their grievances. And of course, pay attention to what the users are doing for the brands as well, again, you know, giving examples to this, let's say I, as a user, I go to a particular brand that I like, and I just gave a positive feedback saying that, you know, I like product, or let's say, I am the one who's making frequent comments and, you know, frequent posts about the simple scenario, you know, first, as you analyze these situations, you create a user profile, and then you're able to send a small voucher or a small coupon or a small deal to this user, and say that, you know, I've seen that you've been very active on my post, and I see that, you know, you're very loyal to our brand. And you like our services, here's a small token of appreciation, a small act, that will create a loyal customer for you for lifetime. And of course, this person will go back to social media and post about you. So you're not able to just handle the negative situations, you're able to handle the positive sentiments of such people. And you're creating a strategy that includes the overall engagement of your user, this will enable your users to engage more with your brand socially. Correct. And, of course, you know, when we talk about b2c brand, specifically, we talk about commerce. I mean, it's very easy for brand to sell on social media, here's how you know you, again, have a post about your product. And if there's a person who's interested in this post, he or she just needs to put on a comment saying that this hair product that you just talking about, can I get this at my location? Or is it available? I location? That's a very frequent question. Now, people don't like to share their private information on public channels. So all you need to do is just dm this person saying that, Okay, I see that you're interested in knowing more about this hair product. And you want to know if this is available in your place, which is in context, you know, the reply is in context. And the next question that you asked this person is, what is your PIN code? Or what is your location? What is your address? And I will tell you if this product is available, the second question could be what is the price of this product? is it available in different different colors? Or any, any of these questions which are directly related to your product? And there are instant replies to this, which can lead to an order right itself on social media?

12:45

Yeah, the steps that you mentioned, they're actually the customer journey. They're you're, you're evaluating in real time you're seeing the stimulus, like in the form of an ad, and you know, you're typing in the comment, suddenly, you have this two way conversation, which is a private conversation. And it's asking you more and more questions, and you're going deeper and deeper into the into the customer journey, isn't it? Leading to a purchase

13:05

Exactly. Starting from pre sales, it's going to post sales as well. Because you know, when you buy a product, you can also ask questions, like, Where's my order? You know, how much time will it take to reach to my order, and all of those questions, which are typical steps in a conversational commerce use case, and you know, who would have thought right from a post, which you do for marketing, you can also convert a lead, or maybe a customer as well. So that's the power of the social media bots. And that's the power of automation that you can bring in, not just from the first message from your user, but also with such engagement such replies mentions comments,

13:46

Right? So I think we covered two main scenarios here. One is like, how do you respond to customers were, were just commenting, like they want to give feedback to a friend, and how do you engage with them. And second is even equally important, or probably more important is how this this port can become sort of a revenue generator. For your ads, it can be like a companion, also for your advertisements that you put out or sponsored posts that you create on your own platform. And as consumers are reacting in the comment section, the bot is taking upon this user journey, private user journey to a closure.

14:20

Yes, these are the situations which are very common, because you know, the first thing that you like to do is generate revenue. And the second part would be, let's say, engagement, where you can have, you know, on a very different note, when you're doing marketing, you'd like to do contests and you know, you'd like to roll out offers discounts and let's say any kind of game or gamification that you have on social media to improve your engagement and there also this plays a huge role, because it's the same scenario, somebody commenting and saying that, you know, I like this contest. I would like to, let's say, click a selfie with the product. Then send it to you, of course on dm but not on public channels. And you are increasing that engagement every day you are, you know, enabling people to firstly engage with your brand. Secondly, visualize what your brand is doing, and then share it with your friends, which is, of course, the best part of marketing that we can achieve. So it is relevant in all course. And it is very essential for all the businesses and brands to understand this tool and then find the right fit with their businesses. So it can be used for, you know, marketing, it can be used for content marketing, it can be used for subscriber based marketing as well. All you need to do is apply these automation tools to your existing strategies, and you have a product fit.

15:47

So some hygiene questions, I guess, on behalf of our audience members, like these are some of the questions that typically come up. So first question is like, my brand may be present on multiple social platforms like Facebook, or Instagram or Twitter. So does this technology, the social bot work across all of them? Is it seamless? How easy? Is it to just is it plug and play? You know, how do we get started with something like this?

16:11

So on gupshup, yes, it is plug and play, we've devised the right kind of tools for so that the heavy lifting work is carried out by us. And you know, all you get to do is connected with your Facebook page with your instruct counts, and you can get a product so it is easily usable and integrable, with your platforms, for sure. When it comes to what kind of channels supported, we have this on Instagram, on Twitter, and on Facebook, right now, any of the social media channels that you know, you would require these features as we just have to talk to those integration details, and I think we can get it out. But one thing that, you know, we need to note here is all the channels are way different. The kind of integrations which are allowed on channels, that's also very different, you know, it's the same as chatbots, there are certain limits and rules and regulations which come up with every channel. And so it's the case with social media as well. But all in all, every use case that you have, it finds a fit, right, and goes normalizations and how it can work seamlessly on all channels, that's a headache that, you know, we carry on for you. So you don't need to worry, they're

17:21

great to know. Cool, thanks, Nikki. And I think this is one of the pain points. In fact, I also do recollect having a conversation with the CMO of a leading FMCG brand, recently, and he was telling me that they don't have a D to C presence yet. So they don't have a ecommerce website. So they distribute in this in the traditional manner through a lot of retailers and shops and things like that. So he was telling me that, you know, people, they buy the product, and if they want to give positive feedback or negative feedback, they follow them on social, and they drop in their, their input saying, you know, I liked it, or I didn't like it. And his struggle was, you know, how do I keep track, so he was doing it manually. So he had somebody or a group of people who just everyday sit and scan for manually scan for comments, and I'm just thinking about his scenario. And I'm envisioning something like this being a game changer for that company, you know, but as they grow, and as more and more people give feedback, they can just convert these very public comments into personalized one on one conversations to serve a variety of ends, which is customer satisfaction at one and community engagement at the other end. And also, more importantly, you know, making sure that that particular follower or customer is a friend of the brand, that doesn't feel alienated just because no one is responding to them. So I think this is a solution that can really bring brands and followers closer, which is what conversational messaging does, you know, if you look at it conceptually, also, it's private one on one conversations at scale. It's not a broadcast medium, but it can just convert these broadcast messages into private one on one conversation. So I think this is a good manifestation of that in the form of a product. You know,

19:07

absolutely. I mean, when we started with the conversation space, there was the start line that needs to go around that, you know, be with the brands are, or, you know, especially that got converted into B where the users are, because you know, you go to channels where users would like to talk to you, not on channels where you want your users to come and talk to you, right. And this is exactly that, you know, you go into social media and you go into channels, and you go into resorts where users like interacting with the brands, and they need to feel that personalization, and they need to be felt special, right. And the only way that we can do this is through these automation tools that we have.

19:48

Great, thank you so much Niyati for your time once again. And to our listeners, thank you for tuning in. And do think about your own social media followers and how you're engaging with them today. And maybe reflect on how social bot technology can actually bring you closer to your followers. Thank you once again for tuning in, and next week, we'll rejoin you with yet another product create another innovation in the area of conversation message. Thank you for tuning in. Thanks, Niyati. 

20:18 

Thank you.