At a recent World social media mob flash held in Lagos Nigeria where we have the gathering of social media enthusiasts, professionals and those who intend to use social media, the audience was generally talking about best use of social media in Nigeria by corporate organizations in our environment.
People suggested GTBank Plc should be rated as one the best uses of online community in Nigeria. As moderators of the session, we asked that audience should give reasons for their suggestions and can we all looked at the brand’s online initiative, presence and activities together in the face of best practise internationally. Given the fact that Community is supposed to be an agglomeration of people with common interest, who have common language and where everyone has a say. Also, the community members of today do not want organization to talk at them but to talk with them. They desire dialogue, conversation and feedbacks. Strong community does not rest solely on the game of number; it is the extent, depth of interaction and engagement
This view has been supported by Lani Rosales when he wrote ‘there is no value in ‘friend collecting/likes’ but there is a massive value in building your network…If the end goal is to put money(through the relationship you are building) in your pocket(or build relationship as the case may be), stop friend collect, build network’. Brand community is not about the community creator; it is all about engaged network that speaks the truth and promotes the brand.
There is no online community that will become celebrated when it is only the brand that is speaking and does not allow feedback. No solid relationship has been built on Monologue. When a brand does not give room for feedback, it will lose enough credibility it is supposed to get. To gain word of mouth, clients or community member must be allowed to ask question, express their opinions. As we know word of mouth is a cultural accelerator but the brand must set up the architecture to engage audience.
To create a worldwide rave about a brand online in which people help to tell your story, you must be ready to lose control. We are in the age of information democratization and not monologue or broadcasting. If there are virtual strings attached (feedbacks on the ‘wall’ of GTBank Facebook page is deactivated), people will not engage you or choose to speak to you or for you about your offerings.
When a brand sets up online engagement mechanism with a mission to listen, get opinion of the community, it will always lead to a higher social intelligence and better leadership for the brand. Juliet Powell says’ while traditional leadership understanding of leadership structures stressed the need for power and stern guidance (as we see GTBank seems to be doing with its community now) new structure of leadership (which GTBank community is aiming to achieve) is based on empathy, two-way communication…to be an effective leader, you need a team (community members/stakeholders) that supports you and is willing to work hard not only on your behalf, but on their own as well for you’.
Given the above, how many of the close to sixty thousand ‘friends’ of GTBank on its Facebook page are singing, propagating GTBank Orange rules yet?. GTBank now has easy access to gather enough feedback it will spend money on yet it has muffed the voices of its community by removing facility/applications that will make it get feedback through the setting it is operating now. In a Nielsen’s report on ‘Why Banks should listen in Social media’, it clearly states that when banks listen, it gives the feeling of stability, solidity, partnership, empathy and understanding.
For its Twitter page, it is well designed with care and we must give kudos for this. But what is the value of a beautiful house whose family members has to listen to the father’s instruction only, while feedbacks are not given attention as fast as the information the father has to push out. We have monitored/followed conversation on that page and we discovered questions are not answered immediately. Speed is important in today’s fast speed online world. A customer that is not answered on time may post a comment that will catch fire within few hours. The bloggers’s post that started ‘DellHell’ got 760 comments among many examples we can cite.
My conclusion on this session is that strong community requires honesty, credibility, openness, willingness to accept feedback irrespective of what they have to say. There is no fear in love (which brand community wants to promote). When dialogue is allowed, it will give the brand the true performance rating of its services to the cherished community. It gives brands opportunity to know how to correct wrong impression, information at the disposal of the clients, community members etc. A great community is not a place to ‘self-promote’, it is an avenue for dialogue, support, engagement, understanding and sharing that will allow members to defend one another. I just hope someone is listening. In all, we ended the analysis on the fact that we should commend the GTBank team for pioneering an online brand community. Our plea is that what is worth doing is worth doing well.