Be conversational with your online customers 

Businesses are now adapting to managing their businesses from anywhere, and this requires communicating online. 
A business’ ability to communicate with its customers online has also changed with new communication tools such as email and instant messaging — and now messaging apps such as WhatsApp and Messenger. 

In this digital era, businesses can now promote and market themselves online. However, for these businesses to stand out; they ought to effectively communicate their businesses online.  

The language used on these different online platforms such as Twitter, FaceBook, LinkedIn, Tik Tok and Instagram, among others, tends to vary if you are targeting  customers through online spaces.  

Ms Immaculate Nantongo is an entrepreneur behind ‘My Fabulous Home’ which is a renowned Facebook page or a community where members post about different construction and home-based themes, including interior and décor.
However, Ms Nantongo notes that before creating the page in 2017, she regularly surfed different social media pages that catered for particular needs of readers. 
This, she says, was the beginning of her journey of creating ‘My Fabulous Home Facebook page’. 
“I wanted this to be a platform for different construction professionals through which they would connect with clients. This meant different members would share their different construction stories,” she recounts. 

Today, Nantongo is inspiring people to have incredible homes with beautiful spaces and trending themes using the Facebook platform to involve an audience of over 9,000 members under the ‘My Fabulous Home’ page that she created in 2017. The group focuses on sharing ideas on construction, property acquisition, home improvement, and exterior and Interior designs.

“To have effective communication online, you must know that it is a full time job and requires a lot of time running an online page because you always have to monitor whatever is going on, on the page and reply to members using personal messages,” she adds.  
Nantongo is one of those entrepreneurs that is reaping from online communication while growing her audiences and clientele. 

John Babirukamu, general manager, Hedge Marketing – Creative & Digital Marketing and communications agency,  says the best way of communicating is to use Colloquial English, that is use a little slang, but not too much. 
 “Keep it simple and plain. People do not use formal English that often on social media; so brands that stick to formal language come off as plastic and aloof,” Babirukamu says.

 Asked whether persuasion is still relevant in this era, he explains that the best form of persuasion is to show people which means; demonstrate your product or service. 
 This, he says, explains why they (marketers) choose to map out a customer journey which includes awareness – When a customer gets to learn of the product, consideration – where you show the benefits of your product and purchase- where you show the customer how to buy.

 In addition, the map includes; retention – where you learn what the customer likes or dislikes and advocacy – where you get to use  customer testimony to convince others. 
 
Analysing comments
 He elucidates that comments are very key in measuring your customers’ sentiment, awareness levels, and how adept they may be at using your product. 
 “Which online communication, unlike traditional media, we have readily available online tools that help you measure these metrics and give you alerts to the changing patterns in customer satisfaction. Tools like Meltwater, an online analytics tool, gives you comparison with your competitors so you can measure your share of voice,” Babirukamu adds.
 
Understanding audiences
 Babirukamu notes that in order to understand online audience for effective communication for businesses, they create a balance between using the classic Socio-economic classification models like NRS Social Grading that uses a scale of ABCDE for different classes, that was developed in the 1950 and other methods.

 These are standard classification models used in marketing across channels.
 He quickly notes that for online communications, however, “we also have to consider the dominant social classifications on each social media channel.”

 For example, Facebook is dominated by traders looking to utilise its market place, probably the best of all social media, but your 45+ year-olds also use it as a secondary channel after WhatsApp. Your upper-class & Middle-class Youth are on Instagram, your corporate types are on LinkedIn, and TikTok is dominated by your lower-income users. These are not the entire users, but the largest segments per platform.

 Defining by age, gender & colour
This means that you have to be strategic with who you are talking to. The world has different sets of audiences which range from gender, age bracket, colour and style. 

Passive or conversational messages
A few years ago communication was passive. Today, the right communication style must be conversational and engaging. This means that you must have a message loop and feedback, listen and react to what they say.

He notes that communication online is still changing with the invention of Artificial Intelligence (AI) since customers have access to choice and information which is in their hands.  
Today it’s nearly impossible to hide information about anything from the price of the phone to durability and quality because people have access to this information because customers are becoming investigators utilising the digital tools. 

Preferred language
Collins Hinamundi, digital monetisation consultant says to communicate your business online, you can use various platforms such as social media, email, instant messaging, and video conferencing.
 “It is essential to use a professional tone. Be clear and concise in your communication. But whatever platform you choose, the message must engage the target audience,” he says.
Different digital platforms have different communication styles, and it’s essential to adapt your communication style to suit the platform.

For example on Twitter, you may need to be more concise and use hashtags to reach a broader audience, while on Facebook, you can use longer posts and include images and videos to capture your audience’s attention.
There is even Tiktok where you are speaking to teenagers and have to speak their language.
“The language of online communication is engaging content and catering to your target customers’ basic self-interest such as my product solves this problem for you, my product makes it easy for you to do this,” he explains.