As I visit the websites of many technical startups, as well as more mature businesses, I still too often see a contact page offering nothing but a sterile form for customers to submit, never to be heard from again. Social media connections, if they exist, are buried elsewhere or reserved for monitoring purposes only.

Social media is here, and is the preferred mode of communication by a large segment of your customers, so make it a positive differentiator for your business. Don't force them to use an automated phone response system, or a faceless unresponsive form. Customers are not all like you, and they have choices, so a one size fits all customer service is no longer a viable option.

There are now many resources out there to guide you in building social media into your business and improving your customer experience, including the book from multicultural marketing expert Kelly McDonald, Crafting the Customer Experience for People Not Like...