CAnton sa Elbi

When my sister’s office mates decided to take a road trip to Los Baños two weeks ago, I just had to include in their list a visit to Café Antonio. I insisted that after a long day of hiking to Mt. Makiling’s mudspring and flat rocks, touring the UPLB campus, and searching for the best buko pie in town, they just had to hang out in this bright orange coffee shop in LB square to chill and wind down. Aside from being the only coffee shop in the area, Café Antonio stands out because of its youthful vibe and boisterous mix of students, professors, and yuppies drinking their frothiccinos and frajellis.

Fondly called “CAnton” by the regulars, Café Antonio was put up in 2008 by then fresh graduates of UPLB who incidentally were classmates in UP Rural High School. Now on its third year, CAnton has become a buzz place for holding art exhibits, poetic sojourns, open mic nights, and other gigs. Like many small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), Café Antonio depends a great deal on Social Media like Multiply, Facebook, and Twitter to advertise and receive feedback from their customers.

According to Steve McKee, small business owners should realize that it’s worth their time to learn how to maximize the use of social media. After all, aside from being free of charge, these networks level the playing field between small businesses and corporate giants. Also, if kept updated and responsive to the customer’s needs, “social media can be a valuable source for customer acquisition, retention and satisfaction.” One simple gesture of using social media is to take time acknowledging customers that mention the store’s name or product in their blogs, Facebook notes, or tweets. Actually responding to these comments or even just liking their posts give the customers an opportunity to associate restaurants, stores and other venues with the people behind them. Another practical tip is to post signage on the store to indicate the fact of being social media-friendly. This sends out the message that that the store is serious in maintaining relationships with their customers in whatever means possible.