Week 3A - Communication

Communication is key in business. I recently experienced some difficulty communicating with a business in trying to plan a back to school luncheon for the teachers at my daughter's school. A local restaurant and I were not communicating on the same level. My initial conversations and emails with this restaurant indicated that the business was willing to  provide a discount  as a gesture of goodwill to help us stay within a PTSA budget.  I had promised positive feedback and public appreciation on all of our school social media in return for this gesture. However, after I made the deposit, the owner and caterer went back on their word and warned that the budget would not allow for enough food.  I took my issues and criticism privately and directly to a manager, who addressed them. In the end, we had enough food, were within our budget, and the restaurant still made a decent profit. I did withhold any positive feedback on social media for this establishment, given the difficulty they had given me.  Because my situation was unique, I chose not to bring my complaints and communication publicly on social media, though.

 I think a social media communication can help speed the response time from business to consumer in the case of a complaint, however I don't know that overall efficiency, service, or products are improved from public social complaints. Some social media users unfortunately gain satisfaction from a public rant on social media, but they don't provide enough detail to help the business resolve the issue and make amends going forward. I prefer to take criticism more privately to a company's management via email or phone call because I think that more pointed comments sometimes with my own recommendations are more valuable to the business owner for their own practices. From my restaurant example, consumers can have unique circumstances and needs that everyone else may not be able to relate to.

I prefer the old management tactic of "praise in public, criticize in private," when it comes to social media. If I had a business, I would respond to public complaints swiftly and courteously, but would then take the rest of the resolution offline. I would recognize public praise with appreciation. I would use both the criticism and praise to determine what my business is doing right and wrong. I would also use social media communication data to monitor trends and tastes. I typically use social media to praise businesses that I have had good experiences with.

I know platforms like Facebook can now track a business's response time, so I have started to ask a few businesses questions through Facebook. The responses however, have not seemed to be as quick as I would have thought. I then tend to fall back on phone calls or emails. Even with social media platforms, a business must have the staff dedicated to making the appropriate and timely responses, and proper management of the media.