How Small Businesses Can Harness Social Media

Small businesses make up an enormous portion of the American economy, and in many ways, they represent the portion of the economy that is best situated to take advantage of social media. After all, many small businesses rely on close, personal relationships with their clients to sustain and grow their business. These relationships can be extended if the small businesses make proper use of social media. However, a recent survey found that fully 88 percent of businesses don’t believe they are making the best use of social media.


The problem often times is that these companies wade into the social media waters without a clear idea of how they should approach social channels, or which social channels are best for their needs. As a result, they end up using Google Plus, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Tumblr, and doing none of them particularly well. The goal with social media should not be simply having a presence in all of the different channels that are available. Instead, it should be having an effect presence in one or two channels, and then perhaps expanding to others once the first channels have been mastered.


An important part of mastering social media is re-framing the way companies view it. Rather than looking at social media simply as another tool for broadcasting to consumers, companies should view it also as a means of gleaning information from their established customers and potential clients. Companies, especially small ones that stand to benefit from close relationships with a few clients, should use social media to learn about what’s happening with their clients, and then keep in touch based on those happenings. For instance, a small note from a business when a client’s birthday comes up on Facebook can make a big impression. Too many businesses miss out on such opportunities to talk to their customers.


The best part about a limited approach to social media is that it saves time. When a business spends time spreading itself thin across a range of social media, typically that’s just time wasted that could be better spent on other projects. By limiting their focus to just one or two social media channels, businesses will cut time lost to other channels, and encourage themselves to take full advantage of whichever channels they do choose to engage in. And whatever approach they choose, small businesses should always remember that the goal of social media is to strengthen their relationships and ties to customers.


When those customers start calling, you’d better make sure your phone system is ready to take on the new influx of calls! Have you looked into a Hosted PBX or SIP Trunking lately?

Better Support for Social Media and Mobile Devices with Call Center Software

Avaya Flare is starting to offer quite a few benefits to help improve call centers and provide unified communications. Now, it’s possible for employees to have better access to the contact center, as well as tools that they need to do their job better. One of the ways that Avaya Flare is helping is with the various mobile device options and social media features that it offers now. All of these tools should help to improve the performance of the contact center.

The advanced technology in the smartphones that we use is quite impressive, and they certainly help to make unified communications, no matter where one might be, a simple task. The technology actually makes it possible to interact with contact center operations. Some of the options that Avaya Flare was able tointroduce with call center functionality include automation, self-service options that customers can use, and it makes it easy to connect with a person, all in the quest for more unified communications.

The company also created some better support for social media outlets including YouTube and RSS feeds. They are even offering better support for Google Plus, Twitter and Facebook, the kings of social media. Video collaboration is even possible now, making it a good tool for a contact center. While software is certainly a huge part of the company’s unified communications goal, they excel in other areas as well. Their phone hardware is also high quality. With Avaya Flare and Aura, companies are starting to really see all of the great things that this type of technology is able to do – from better and easier relations in the contact center to easier, better quality unified communications through the company.

The pricing is something that is going to be a concern for many companies. Avaya has their social and mobile capability service starting at $30,000 and up for a session. They also offer Call Center Elite for the contact center for between $350 and $750 for each license. Avaya is one of the most popular choices when it comes to this type of technology and support. They announced that they would continue to offer support for mobile devices other than phones as well, such as the iPad.

When looking for unified communications solutions, companies need to make sure that they are dealing with a vendor who will be able to provide them the support and help that they need for their contact center and other areas of their business. Choose the right company for help.