Society of Consumer Affairs Professionals (SOCAP)

About SOCAP

I have been working in the field of customer service for nearly 10 years. And one of the most valuable ways in which I have been able to grow my business is through networking. Networking with other like-minded professionals. Networking with customer service professionals across a broad range of industries. Networking with other customer service trainers and speakers. As always, it's not what you know it's who you know!

As you probably already know I recently became involved with the Society of Consumer Affairs Professionals or SOCAP. Up until November last year I was almost completely ignorant of SOCAP. I knew that it existed. But I knew nothing at all about how it operated or what its purpose was. In March this year I was asked to take on the role of Chief Executive for SOCAP in Europe. And almost every day since then has been a WOW! day for me. And this is why I want to advertise SOCAP to you. If you want to mix with, to learn from and to do business with other customer service professionals then I strongly recommend that you join SOCAP.

For example, here is just a small sample of some of the businesses that are represented amongst the SOCAP in Europe membership:

WOW!!!! And this is just a small sample of the businesses that are members. And when I look at the job titles for the individuals concerned words like customer service director, operations director, chief executive, quality manager, HR director, managing director, head of consumer affairs, etc etc etc keep coming up. WOW!!!! Can you see an opportunity here? Or am I getting excited over nothing?

What I'm trying to say to you is that I think SOCAP represents an AMAZING opportunity for me. And maybe for you! So what do we do at SOCAP? We try to meet the needs of our members. And we do it in a variety of ways. Hers are some of the benefits of membership:

• Customer Management - a 60-page journal published six times a year providing up to the minute articles from industry leaders.
• SOCAP News - a monthly electronic newsletter distributed by e-mail.
• Information Directory - the SOCAP web site provides access to a range of articles and publications as well as links to other helpful sites.
• Seminars - a programme of events on topics important to members.
• Networking Events - visits to member's offices to share ideas, observe best practices and improve knowledge.
• Training Programmes & Workshops - designed to address specific knowledge gaps.
• Informal Networking - through the membership directory members are encouraged to contact others to benchmark, share ideas and improve knowledge.
• Specific Support - the Chief Executive provides an informal response to individual members? requests for information.
• Promotion of the Consumer Affairs & Customer Service Profession - through SOCAP organised awards, press releases, links with other organisations and other external activities, SOCAP aims to raise the profile of customer care and in turn the importance of members' role within their organisation.
• Advertise your job vacancies - Completely free of charge and a great way to target people within the customer services sector.

If you would like to get involved with SOCAP in Europe then please contact me or visit the web site at www.socapeurope.org If you are outside of Europe and would like to be involved, SOCAP has operations in most parts of the world including the United States, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand and many more. Simply enter SOCAP into your favourite search engine and I'm sure that you will find a chapter local to you. I hope that you will forgive me for making such a blatant advertisement. But if you are really interested in customer service then I think SOCAP will be of interest to you.