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Santuza Bicalho, CEO, STB in Brazil

SB: And that put a lot of people in conversation with [the ambassadors]. And we had problems, but we solved the problems. And now we are running another programme which is very interesting, it is called STB Discover. We are recruiting someone who is going to be paid $3,000 per month to travel to different countries throughout one year.

"We understood social media very early. I thought, if we want to be a good company we have to be transparent"

The PIE: Wow. How many people, just one?

SB: Just one. We have other ideas that I cannot disclose. We have this platform, people send their videos, their history, and they are campaigning as to why they should be the one chosen by STB. We had 7,000 people placing their videos, and 3.5 million page views in less than one month. Incredible.

So we understood [social media] very early. I just had a gut-feeling, I thought if we want to be a good company we have to be transparent. We have to have the courage to talk about ourselves even if we make mistakes.

And we have that on Twitter, we have like “I called STB 20 minutes ago and nobody returned my call!” And then I have a team dealing with Twitter, ok which office did you call? We put people in contact “Oh thank you very much, you are the best,” so we have experienced that.

“In 2010 we started the Online Salesperson project, and we talk to customers by chatting”

The PIE: So how many people do you have working on your Twitter site, for example?

SB: On the internet area we have a team of 12, on Facebook, Twitter and other projects. And then I have an outsourced company which has another team of seven. And in 2010 we started the Online Salesperson project, so we chat over the internet, and we talk to the customers by chatting.

The PIE: So you have found it has been really successful?

SB: Yes, but it is tough to do. It’s not easy, it took us a while you know. The business model was completely different from what we knew.

The PIE: Now, what proportion of your clients do you think come to STB via a social media channel, whether it is chatting, or Twitter?

SB: That is another good question because everybody does. I mean whenever they think about choosing a language programme they go online first, they go to social media. They have a look at what people are talking about. It’s inevitable – that’s how we buy. Think about yourself – how do you buy? I go online first, I check the company.

The PIE: Do you know how many followers you have on Twitter?

SB: Yes – we have 15,000, and on Facebook, 40,000. You can see the movement and interaction, and it is really interesting.

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