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Social Commerce is Evolving and Here to Stay

Despite currently being in their infancy, Social Media commerce and Facebook Commerce, or “F-Commerce,” for acronym lovers, are advancing at an incredible rate. Now is the time for businesses to get on board with the social media revolution as it relates to e-commerce.

The Benefits:

Social media allows for an easy 2-way mode of communication between companies and their customers, that acts more like a personal conversation than a public address; the difference between talking to people and talking at people. “According to eMarketer, 73 percent of U.S. companies in 2010 reported that they see social media as a powerful marketing tool for creating a dialogue between them and their customers.” Clearly, social media has a knack for generating social currency, as research estimates that almost 100 million Facebook users actively share and discuss products or brands with friends through their profile page, which is significant because: “according to The New York Times, 90 percent of online shoppers trust recommendations from people they know, and 87 percent spend more dollars online after seeing recommendations.”

As it stands today, people do not often use social media with an intent to shop, though this shows some signs of possibly changing. For now, engaging potential customers and offering special deals and promotions, are just two ways in which companies can get the most out of their social media presence and possibly prompt consumers to engage in impulse purchases. At the end of the day, Facebook is currently more of a tool than a destination. Focus should be placed on attracting visitors from Facebook to online stores, more than bringing stores into Facebook. The ultimate goal is more customers, not fans and friends.

The question of monetization:

Still, social commerce has some scratching their heads regarding potential ROIs. ‘The Social Shopper,’an Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) report from June 2011, reports: “39% of respondents as saying they are doing a poor job of measuring social media effectively, while 45% say they are just average at it,” in addition “only 6% of respondents reported that they were able to monetize their investment in social media. However, 32% believed monetization had occurred though they could not prove it, and 38% said they had no evidence that monetization had occurred.”

Obviously this means there is room for clarity and improvement, but also and perhaps more importantly, it demonstrates that companies who do already have a strong understanding of their social media situation are the minority, and thus have an advantage over those still lagging behind.

Looking ahead:

When embarking on a social commerce initiative it is important to actively embrace the medium. Successful social commerce requires a simple approach and clear and consistent commitment. Simply dabbling in order to get in on the trend or superficially capitalize on the latest buzzword, will most likely not amount to the desired results. That being said, social commerce is not a short lived fad, and is not going anywhere, anytime soon.

For more about the latest trends in social commerce http://www.imediaconnection.com/article_full.aspx?id=29670 / http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?R=1008527