6 Effective Ways for Product Managers to Use Social Media in 2023

By Gaurav Belani

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Product managers play a crucial role in all the stages of a product development lifecycle. From market research to drafting product specifications, from product design to its deployment, product managers are responsible for connecting various teams while making strategic product-related decisions.

With customer experience being essential for the product's success, product managers are resorting to various platforms to interact with customers on a personal level. Social media is one of them. 

To make the best of this platform and boost process efficiency, they leverage various tools, such as social listening tools, customer tracking tools, product management software, heatmap tools, and more. These help them streamline the overall product development and deployment process.

For instance, a product management tool helps product managers to align the development process according to customer needs. This collaborative tool provides intuitive features that help product managers to analyze, plan, and execute every step of the product lifecycle efficiently. 

Similarly, the social listening tool helps them monitor and analyze the customers' conversations about the product, its competitors, and the overall industry to craft an excellent marketing strategy.

If you are a product manager looking to scale your product horizons, social media is the best medium to begin with. In this article, we shall discuss effective ways to use social media for building better products.

How Product Managers Can Use Social Media in 2023

 

1. Understand the Market Landscape

Market research plays a crucial role in the success of any product. Research helps in understanding the current market standing and offers you a better perspective on the customer's pain points and requirements. It helps you validate your ideas to build better products.

Conduct market research on social media in the following ways.

  • Investigate the market gaps by listening to customer demands. This ensures you deliver a product that offers more value than the competition. 
  • Conduct a competitive analysis for product comparisons and develop a strong business case for your product.
  • Identify and segment your target audience by creating buyer personas, use cases, and more. This will help in making a foolproof product marketing strategy.
  • Host ideation workshops, interview potential customers, and organize discussion sessions on your social media pages to build a commercially viable product.

 

2. Interact with Existing Customers and Prospects

Have conversations with the customers to understand what they like about your product and what they do not. Gain insights into their requirements and how they intend to use your product to their advantage. This will help you in designing and developing a product that is relevant and competitive.

Establish a personal connection with the customers, allowing them to know the human behind the product they use. For example, Visme, a design tool actively engages with its customers by replying to their tweets on social posts regularly.

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Build a deeper relationship based on trust with the customers. Leverage various software, such as social listening tools, social media post scheduler, social media engagement tools, and more to draft a social media marketing strategy for proper and timely communication. 

Engage your customers on social media platforms in the following ways.

  • Write informative posts and support them with the necessary stock images, videos, or GIFs. Keep them short and clear.
  • Respond to the comments and messages you receive on social media pages to understand the customers' reactions to your product. In case of negative comments, acknowledge them and provide a resolution to the customers.
  • Conduct regular contests, giveaways, and other competitions to increase customer engagement. 
  • Create a brand hashtag and promote it in your posts. Encourage your customers to use this hashtag whenever they post about you. This will help you track what people are saying about your brand.

 

3. Seek Qualitative Feedback from Customers

Social media offers the best medium to capture constructive feedback from your customers. Engage your customers with surveys, polls, and more to capture their valuable feedback to understand their likes, dislikes, concerns, and suggestions for your product.

Customer feedback is a strong indicator of customer satisfaction. It makes the customers feel valued and connected to your brand. The insights from this feedback help you design and develop a product that is tailored to customers' needs.

Here are a few effective ways to collect customer feedback through social media.

  • Post a link to the feedback surveys on the product's social media pages. 
  • Use the Facebook messenger auto-responder to send a direct message containing the survey link to the customers who message you. 
  • Configure the Facebook messenger chatbot to craft conversational and interactive surveys in chat format to collect customer feedback. You can also leverage the Facebook comments autoresponder tools to send a message requesting feedback from the followers leaving comments on your Facebook posts.
  • Host a contest on social media that requires customers to fill out a survey to qualify for the same. 
  • Leverage the stories feature of social media platforms to collect customer feedback with the help of polls, questions, quizzes, and other stickers.

 

4. Find Beta Testers for the Product

Grow a base of early adopters for your product before the official launch. Social media, especially Reddit and LinkedIn, is a giant hub of professionals who willingly volunteer to test new products. 

Beta testing helps product managers identify the shortcomings in the product. Let the dedicated development team work on the flaws and bugs discovered by the beta testers and build better features that would enhance the product's value.

With beta testing, you can improve the product's usability and provide a seamless experience to the wider audience upon its launch.

Refer to these tips to get started with building a team of beta testers for your product.

  • Share a post on your product's social media pages calling in professionals for the beta testing opportunity.
  • Seek out followers who may have shown interest in this kind of collaboration in the past.
  • Be an active participant in community forums on various social media channels.
  • Incentivize the opportunity to appreciate the effort the beta testers have put into testing your product. 

Check out this post. Lindsey from Hazel Haven Blog is looking for beta testers for a course on creating designs with Canva. In this post, she highlights an offer (free course) in exchange for an action (beta testing).

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5. Advertise the Latest Product Capabilities

Promote the product and its features on social media to attract a wider audience and grow the customer base. Share news about upcoming updates or product roadmap with the customers to keep them informed about how the product is growing.

Here are a few tips to help you with product advertising on social media.

  • Create an appealing profile on all social media channels, incorporating virtual headshots for a personalized touch. Ensure that the profile is updated with fresh images, accurate contact details, and an article link about the product release.
  • Draft an engaging post copy by experimenting with different tones, writing styles, and more for different social media platforms.
  • Create targeted ads about upcoming product releases to reach out to a wider audience.
  • Tailor custom offers and social-only discounts on subscription plans for the customers.

 

6. Build a Community of Loyal Customers

Having a community promotes engagement which is essential for businesses as it brings customers closer and increases brand visibility. It creates a welcoming environment for you and the customers to share stories about product experiences, network and build professional connections, and inspire one another to grow.

You will be surprised to know the impact you might make in contributing to the community. Here are some tips to help you out.

  • Build a community of customers and prospects who are interested in your product or the industry it caters to.
  • Subscribe to relevant communities on social media that might house your potential customers.
  • Gather feedback from the community members about some new feature or UX mockup to have a brief idea about customers' reactions in the early stages of product development.
  • Let the community members know you are always available to help them by sharing mediums through which they can connect with you.
  • Offer them the right resources, such as ebooks, checklists, swipe files, templates, and more. 
  • Appreciate the community members who take the time to help each other by sharing resources, learning about the latest industry trends, providing guidance, and more.
  • Avoid controversial discussions, polarized topics, or anything that could hurt the sentiments of your community.

For example, ZenDesk, a customer relationship management software, has an active community of customer service enthusiasts. Check out their community page to understand the tactics they follow to keep the members engaged. 

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Conclusion

Social media helps businesses with intelligent insights into customer behavior, pain points, and preferences. By providing a direct connection to potential and existing customers, social media plays a significant role in building a customer-centric product. Follow the tips mentioned in this post to build an innovative product.

 

(Image Source: Pexels)

About the company...

The team at Social Hire won't just do social media management. Our team work with you to ensure your business sees great value from the service and that your team gets tangible results.

The social media marketing team in our company are the best in the business at helping our partners enhance their online marketing. We create and implement original social media marketing plans that help our customers accomplish their organisational objectives and build up their online footprint.

Our specialists are a company that assists our customers further their presence online by giving online marketing on a regular basis.

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