By Mikal E. Belicove|For Entrepreneur.com|April 10, 2012

Knowing what customers find important and how they want to interact with a brand is important to any business’s success. A new study encourages brands to take note of what consumers think is necessary in order to improve a product or service and then make the changes that will satisfy shoppers.

Here are five suggestions from the “Conversation Index” released by Bazaarvoice, a Texas-based company best known for its ratings and reviews software. The tips are garnered from the millions of pieces of user-generated content from online reviews:

Brick-and-mortar shoppers still engage online: Since a reported 70 percent of shoppers say they use their smartphones while in your store, find a way to obtain these shoppers’ email addresses. Ask for online feedback from face-to-face customers, and by any means necessary, offer free Wi-Fi at your business locations.

The “Closed” sign becomes extinct: At least half of online shopping takes place after hours, with the iPad being the main culprit in this change of habit. That means you should remain engaged every hour of every day. You need to have customer support, chat, tweets, and Facebook posts available 24/7 if you expect to deliver “overnight results.”

It’s not all about shopping: Your Facebook Page (and to some degree, even your…

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