In today’s society the emphasis on customer service and client relations should be of upmost importance and the primary mandate for all business’s and the people they employ.

The power of the social media sphere has taken the term “word of mouth” and turned it into “word of mouth on digital steroids”! We are now all living in a glass house.

• 78% of people trust peer recommendation (July 2009 Neilson Global Online Consumers survey) What do your customers and clients say about their personal experience with your products and or services?
• By 2010 Generation Y will outnumber babyboomers… 96% of them have joined a social network (source: Grunwald associates National Study – Trendspotting)
• 80% of twitter usage is outside of twitter…people update everywhere, everytime… imagine what that means for bad customer experiences (source: Attempting to relocate) Imagine what that means for good customer service experience?

What does this mean for the employer?

You are only as good as the people you employ. Do your employees and or contractors understand the importance of customer service and relationships and are you constantly exceeding your customer’s expectations? Can you afford not to?

What does this mean to the employee and or contractor?

It is important to realize that you are not only representing your employer but more importantly you are representing yourself. You have a choice to shine, stand out in the crowd as an exceptional individual building strong relationships providing exceptional customer service experience with all your customers. How would your customers rate their experience with you and would they recommend you to their peers?

We must all do our best to connect with each customer and recognize their individual needs providing honest personal service with integrity. The power of social media and the term “word of mouth on steroids” is exciting for companies and employees who are committed to customer service.

• Because of the speed in which social media enables communication, word of mouth now becomes world of mouth. See source below.

Please refer to \"Social Media 2 (Refresh)\" article by author Erik Qualman where I have obtained many of the facts listed above. I highly encourage anyone who is sceptical with social media to watch the short video “Social Media Revolution 2 (Refresh)” found at the top of this post.

Janis Gall