5. Social Customer Relationship Management

This chapter gives the reader a broader perspective on social media by discussing social customer relationship management (social CRM). Social CRM is the best example of a multidisciplinary social media approach, as it involves almost all departments in the organization. Instead of only contacting people with sales offers, the aim of social CRM is to build strong relationships with Internet users by giving them a positive experience of the organization’s brand, products, and services. Ultimately, social CRM tries to turn an organization’s social media connections into loyal customers and particularly brand advocates who influence others to like the organization (and only indirectly to buy the organization’s products and services). This chapter discusses the use of social CRM and how it can generate business value. As a continuation of the previous chapters, some more advanced monitoring tools are presented for organizations to monitor and evaluate social media actions.