Social Media and Radian6: I Am The Case Study

I ran a Social Media race between Radian6 and Sysomos which Radian6 won hands down.

To be honest I didn't expect much in the way of results, but the outcome has genuinely surprised me.  Radian6 won the race.  They were listening*, they found me and then replied to me in only 13 minutes.  Nice trick?  Yes, but when I look at my experience the power of this tool is apparent.

Firstly the CTO from Radian6 commented on my blog and then within minutes the CEO was following me on Twitter, closely followed by their Community Co-Ordinator:

I have nothing against Sysomos, in fact I was going to wait a bit longer to see if they responded, but I realised that misses the point.  Firstly, Radian6 have shown that they practice what they preach, which is quite a powerful demonstration in it's own right.

Secondly my opinion of Radian6 is now sky high whereas Sysomos would have a lot of catching up to do - but only because I suddenly have a fair amount of brand loyalty to Radian6 which has been built from nothing in a matter of hours - and this is only because Radian6 have pro-actively engaged in conversation with me.

Think about your own businesses and the loyalty you could build with your customers?  As a customer, think about how your opinion would change if a brand manager interacted with you proactively and helpfully?

So congratulations to Radian6.  I count the experiement as a resounding success.  The race was fun too.

Night all.  Over and out.

*Listening:  During my excellent sales training all those years back, the one thing they drummed into me was what they called the salesman's most important skill.  Listening.