There’s just something about Q&A. People have questions and they want answers--right now!
As I mentioned when Facebook Questions finally started rolling out to users, there has never been a shortage of Q&A sites on the Web. Back in the day, it was all about Ask Jeeves, but these days pretty much every search engine is used like a Q&A service. Then there’s Quora, ChaCha, Hipster, Yahoo! Answers and a million other new and not-so-new sites for asking and answering questions.
But what about when you want to ask a company something? Do you look up their customer service phone number and give them a ring, or do you turn to the Web? It seems the latter is becoming quite the popular option, especially with the rise of social media.
Six in 10 global Twitter users said they wanted businesses to respond to their questions on Twitter, even when those questions weren’t directly targeted at a specific brand, according to May 2011 research from InboxQ. The figure is slightly higher for users with 100 followers are more, but not by much.
Additionally, eight in 10 users said that answers posted by businesses were at least as trustworthy as those from ordinary individuals.
In spite of all that, only 21 percent of users with under 100 followers and 41 percent of users with 100 or more followers have ever received reply from a business.
So what’s the big deal: if most brands aren’t doing it, then it’s probably not good for business, right? Quite wrong.
Apparently, 64 percent of Twitter users around the world said they would be more likely to make a purchase from a band that answered their question on the microblogging site. Only 24 percent of users said they would be just as likely and (a kind of odd) 12 percent said they would be less likely.
As eMarketer notes, InboxQ has a stake in publishing this kind of data, since the company helps businesses answer questions that concern their brand or industry. But the truth is that social media has always been about greater interactivity, first between friends and family on Facebook, and now between just about anyone on Twitter. And for businesses and brands, that means listening to and responding to customers.
There is one thing that brands have no problem replying to on Twitter, and that’s praise:
