Surveys and Social Media

 Surveys and Social Media

This week we learned that social media includes much more than just blogs and Facebooks. I learned that it could include surveys and feedback from visitors or customers as well. Starbucks has one of the best social media outlets due to their My Starbucks Idea webpage. 

“The site allows users to submit suggestions to be voted on by Starbucks consumers, and the most popular suggestions are highlighted and reviewed. Starbucks then took it a step further and added an “Ideas in Action” blog that gives updates to users on the status of changes suggested.”

It’s kind of like a mini share site that allows customers to rant or rave. Starbucks gets the feedback that they want, while also comforting the customer. The ideas include anything from drink ideas to company efficiency.

I actually work for Starbucks and if there is one thing the company is good at, it is listening to its customers and employees. They created community service outlets for the employees, applications for the customers, feedback comment cards in-store and my Starbucks idea webpage.

I think that Starbucks efficiently uses the feedback aspect of social media in order to gain the following and growth of customers. Sometimes there might not be good feedback, but you will always know what the customers are expecting and how to change your business.

This week I also created a survey for my blog. This way I can learn how others feel about my blog and how to improve it. I appreciate this tool because I now use it on my other blog that correlates more to my company, Food Through Culture. The survey asks what viewers think of my blog and what they think of the company. I asked them what they think about the company because it is a brand new company and their feedback would help determine whether my venture is wanted and possible.

Most people see social media as social networking sites, but it can include communications between employees and customers too. A company can learn a lot about its customers by letting them share their piece of mind.

http://mashable.com/2009/02/06/social-media-smartest-brands/