As brands feel their way through the social customer service dynamic we see, with some regularity, instances where the process is handled badly. In some cases, very badly. And there’s a raft of research condemning companies for slow response times and sloppy query management.

But there are also many examples of brands doing it well, and now new research shows that, overall, companies are taking strides in the right direction.

According to a recent report by Kcom and the Customer Contact Association (CCA), businesses are increasingly turning to social media to help shape the future of their customer services strategy.

In 2011 only 20% of brands were actively monitoring their social channels, now that figures stands at 76%, indicating that more businesses are understanding the power and influence of social media. The latest findings show that:

• 68% use social media as an opportunity to engage with customers
• 89% use information from monitoring social media to help refine their customer service
• 90% of those monitoring and refining said the process helped them to manage their brand reputation
• 66% of industry experts have trained their staff in using social media so that customer experiences can be logged and improved.

The research also finds that brands are more comfortable sharing – and dealing with – negative publicity and complaints.

“Face to face doesn’t have the same impact. Voicing concerns and enquiries publically generates a better response.” says Mark Pritchard, business development director at Kcom. “Therefore businesses need to have the ability to manage negative responses on social media – a complaint isn’t always a terrible thing. If an organisation responds and acts upon the comment, it can actually create a good customer experience.”