Use Social Media to Boost Online Christmas Sales

Christmas is here and businesses across the World are gearing up to make the most of the festival and gifting season. New products are getting launched, special offers and discounts being announced and retail spaces both offline and online being decked up to be in sync with the festival spirit.

 

The only dampener seems to be various predictions coming our way, which suggest the holiday season will see less sales when compared to 2007 or before the recession hit our economy towards the end of 2008.

According to a Gallup poll, a record-high 35% of Americans spent less on Christmas gifts in 2008 than what they spent a year before. This year National Retail Federation chief economist Rosalind Wells predicts “As the global economy continues to recover from the worst economic crisis most retailers have ever seen, Americans will focus primarily on practical gifts and shop on a budget this holiday season.” 

Now correlate these predictions to a survey report by Nielsen Wire and you will probably have the answer on how to focus your marketing budgets and efforts to get the most out of this holiday season.  

In a recent Nielsen Global consumer survey of 25,000 internet consumers from across 50 countries it was found that 90 per cent of the consumers surveyed said they trust recommendations by people they know, while 70 per cent trusted consumer opinions posted online. Jonathan Carson, President of Online, International, for the Nielsen Company observes, “The explosion in Consumer Generated Media over the last couple of years means consumers’ reliance on word of mouth in the decision-making process, either from people they know or online consumers they don’t, has increased significantly.”  

The Nielsen survey clearly showcases the power social media yields in our times.

Social media sharing over channels like Facebook, Myspace, Twitter etc. have today become a way of life for most of us. These social networking sites have become a medium for people to share information with their family, friends, acquaintances and even like minded strangers. It’s also become a place where people discuss politics, products, issues and causes, garnering support and voicing their views all at the same time. It is this powerful medium which needs to be tapped in a way that it helps retailers spread the word and increase their sales.  

So how can ecommerce sites or e-retailers use this information to boost their sales?

 Simple, device methods and provide means to a happy customer – ‘To spread the good word’ and in turn bring in more business for you.

Given below are three simple and easily implementable methods -

Provide the means

If you have an ecommerce site, ensure you provide the right tool for your customer to share his find with others in his network. There are plenty of options available, you can have individual tabs/buttons for different social networking sites like – facebook.com, twitter.com, delicious.com etc. or you can have social media sharing widgets which give multiple channel options like AddThis, ShareThis or Tell-a-Friend .  You can also find drop down tool bars which offer similar services. These referral tools give a visitor the option to share a content he sees on a page with his network of friends through various channels. Having these social media elements on your website will ensure that if any of your happy customers want to spread the word, they have the means to do it in an easy and systematic way. 

Provide the motivation 

The objective here is to give your customer an incentive or motivation to spread the word. While in the previous method, you leave him with the choice of spreading the word about your great offering amongst his network of friends, here you reward him for this extra effort.  

The method is simple – you link your referral and rewards program – so every time a customer refers you to his friend he gets a discount or some reward points which he can claim for his current or future purchases.  

The person to whom the customer does send the recommendation is not aware the product was referred to him in lure of the discount. In fact, he sees it as a genuine recommendation from a friend, who bought the product, enjoyed the experience and decided to share the information. Hence, it becomes a win-win situation for all involved. Your offering gets a third party personal and reliable endorsement and hence another more convinced customer. Your referrer customer gets a discount on his purchases and the person receiving the recommendation gets a first hand opinion or reference on something he is planning to buy.  

Recently John Lawson an eBay Platinum PowerSeller and eBay Certified Education Specialist who owns an ecommerce site and authors an ecommerce blog –ColderIce posted a video on his personal experience of using one such widget which combines both the referral and rewards program and which helped in boosting his ecommerce sales. You can watch his video to know more about this ecommerce tool from SocialTwist.  

Nurture you customer relationships  

It is very important for any retailer to build his customer base and also to retain them. Social media can be a great tool in building and nurturing these relationships. As a retailer, it would help you to be present on social networking sites like Facebook, Myspace, Twitter etc. where you can create a profile or fan page for your store. Devise a way to find out where your customers are present (use feedback forms) and be there – it could be any of these social networking sites. Invite your customers to be a part of these groups and profiles and interact with them on a regular basis. Update them about the new stock in your store, steal buys, discounts, collections etc. Invite their feedback, listen to their queries and resolve their complaints and just by keeping in touch you will win their loyalty. If they really value you and your products, it is a given that they will share information on you within their network.  

Social media is here to stay and the best way to use it – is to be a part of it. It is a humungous marketing force available out their – all you need to do is to win them over and help them market your offerings. The returns of this little investment is manifold and beyond ones apprehension.

'Disclosure' The New Way Of Sharing In Social Media?

The new rule by Federal Trade Commission (FTC), requiring bloggers to disclose to their readers if they received any freebie or money for writing about a product came into effect this Tuesday. The first amendment since 1980, the new FTC Guide Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising, states, “The post of a blogger who receives cash or in-kind payment to review a product is considered an endorsement. Thus, bloggers who make an endorsement must disclose the material connections they share with the seller of the product or service.”

The initial reports had stated that, bloggers who failed to disclose that they had received freebies when they write about a product could be fined up to $11,000 per post.

However, later in an interview to PR Newser, Richard Cleland, FTC assistant director and division head for advertising practices, cleared the air and said “The FTC does not have the authority to impose a fine for a violation to the FTC act. There is a provision that allows for a proceeding in federal court that allows for imposing of a monetary penalty for violation of trade regulation laws. The guidelines are not trade regulation laws.”

We are just three days into this new law and I am yet to see any disclaimers on posts for product reviews. But, what I would like to discuss in this post is how is this law which does not penalize the offenders going to make a difference to how we blog? Or how we follow bloggers? 

Blogging is an integral part of social media and the foundation of social media is based on mutual trust. It thrives on the trust we share with those we follow and those who follow us – friends, colleagues, acquaintances or even complete strangers with whom we manage to build online relationships. Using your personal credibility to influence people who rely or believe on your word, in exchange of cash or kind is definitely a breach of this trust. 

As a marketer, who believes in exploiting every possible medium online and offline to spread the word about my clients and their offerings – It is good have people around on the Internet who are ‘influencers’ in their own right and who do not mind getting an incentive for using their word to influence others. Getting them to talk positively about my client makes good business sense because not only does this bring my client, some good publicity helping create a social reputation but also in many cases brings in convinced customers and assured sales. 

However, as a regular internet user who uses this medium to research and seek the correct information before making purchasing decisions – it feels bad to look back and wonder if the last cool gadget review I read was paid for? I trust some of these reviewers and treat their knowledge and opinions as gospel when it comes to technology. I feel they have the know-how and they can help me make better choices…now I am not so sure. 

When I look at the larger picture I feel this new FTC law (not sure how effective it is going to be and how many people will actually add such disclaimers to their paid for posts/reviews) might just be able to restore some amount of honesty in the way we function both as marketers and bloggers. 

I see that as a consumer I will be more skeptical of taking a review on face value if it comes attached with a disclaimer of being paid for in cash or kind or having any association with the seller. The review might be very critical in its approach but still, I will probably take it with a pinch of salt.

I think I will search further for unbiased opinions and take them more seriously even if the blogger is less influential and less known than the more popular ones I used to follow. 

If as a customer, my reactions are such, as a marketer I will have to make a Choice.

Choice between a blog post which shows it is paid for and one which is genuine and purely merit based.

More than money I would like to depend on the qualities of my client’s offerings when pitching to a blogger, to ensure he posts a review which is genuine and not influenced by the lure of an incentive. Because only these unbiased posts might now bring my client real value and real customers. 

There is another change I am hoping to see as a fall out of this law – Blogging will hopefully go back to being what it was – sharing a truthful relationship with your readers. The top bloggers will have to give up on the lure of incentives if they want to maintain their supremacy and personal credibility among their followers and the social mediaspere. Marketers will have to follow suite, for now – they will have customers who will know if a post is a genuine review or a paid endorsement. 

Moreover, it’s not just blogging, other social media channels will soon and should see such regulations in the near future. Today we know that influential tweeters on twitter are getting paid huge sums of money for tweets that endorse a product, service or person. And if they do not disclose, their one of the many ‘must try’ tweet was paid for heftily…..they have actually cheated those who made them this influential. 

Personally, I see this law as the system’s way of pushing back a trend which was trying to ruin the very foundation of Social Media – TRUST.

Update: December 3 – 6:10 pm

Adding the Google point on this new law -

Google’s Matt Cutts in a conversation with Jeff Jarvis said, “As a Google engineer who has seen the damage done by fake blogs, sock puppets, and endless scams on the internet, I’m happy to take the opposite position: I think the FTC guidelines will make the web more useful and more trustworthy for consumers. Consumers don’t want to be shilled and they don’t want payola; they want a web that they can trust. The FTC guidelines just say that material connections should be disclosed. From having dealt with these issues over several years, I believe that will be a good thing for the web.”

How to successfully use word of mouth marketing in a B2B set up

In my last post I had shared with you the importance of Word of mouth marketing and why it should be an integral part of every Company’s PR and marketing plan.

In this post I share with you some statistics to prove this. In a recent report by Nielsen Global Online Consumer survey of over 25,000 Internet consumers from 50 countries, it emerged that “Recommendations from personal acquaintances or opinions posted by consumers online are the most trusted forms of advertising. Ninety percent of consumers surveyed noted that they trust recommendations from people they know, while 70 percent trusted consumer opinions posted online.”

These results are quite significant as it reaffirms the power of Internet/online media and in particular the growing influence of social media. Today as marketers we are dealing with a more aware, informed and inquisitive consumer, who has several channels and mediums to seek information about a company, its products and the quality delivered, before making a purchase.

While WOMM is critical to any business, it is hard to generate, especially for B2B clients where the target audience is niche. In a B2C scenario, some success can be expected, by ensuring a quality product which caters to a significant need of the end consumers; by creating awareness and excitement for the product among the target group using various media channels; by listening to their suggestions and feedbacks and improvising on the products if required and foremost by keeping the channels of communication always open between the company and its end consumers.

In B2B since the stakes are higher, referrals are not easy to come by, also clients refer your services or products to other businesses if they themselves have tried, tested and are completely satisfied with your services over a period of time. In such cases the gestation period for generating leads through referrals can be a lengthy and uncertain process. Following some of the B2C procedures mentioned above might speed up the process and might ensure a more satisfied customer but may not result in a referral.

So how do you ensure that your customers in both B2C and B2B type of businesses give you referrals?

It is simple – incentivise their referrals! Combine a referral with a reward program, it could be discounts, it could be entering a sweepstake program, giveaways, any reward program that you can link to your product or service and your customers can benefit from.

Giving incentives for referrals – HELPS

By initiating such a marketing activity, you give your customers an added incentive to refer you, in the process ensuring both parties involved are happy.

When planning such a program ensure you are present in every medium which your end customer uses – these might vary for B2C and B2B companies.

The marketing and PR should be well planned and coordinated, so that you reach out to all your customers. For the time period the program is running, all your messaging should work towards promoting the program, on your website, on your ads, billboards, on your press releases, on social media forums, wherever you expect your customers to be.

It is only a matter of time before the technique starts finding you success!

Such programs are not new, have been tried and tested by several companies over the years, and have found success even offline.

I am sure most of you will remember the simple referral campaign run by the magazine Reader’s Digest. Fill in 14 addresses of people you know and win an interesting book in return. They would then reach out to your contacts with a personalized letter stating you thought your friend would like subscribing to Reader’s Digest. Simple but effective way of referral marketing and it did help the magazine to a great extent in becoming one of the most read magazines in the world, even though it was circulated only through subscriptions(not sold on stands), until some years ago. I have filled many such forms as a teenager in lure of the books and have seen many of my family and friends subscribing to the book….see I told you it always works

In a world where there are so many voices and opinions some times it helps to raise the stakes……..