For anyone working with the word of mouth marketing industry, it’s safe to assume that discussions around ROI come around like clockwork, as our clients continue to face the challenge of selling in what is still a relatively new channel to their internal stakeholders.
The good news is that the rise of social commerce – a relatively new WOM phenomenon – looks set to prove a major opportunity for brands and word of mouth marketers looking to monetise word of mouth measurably – at least that’s the view of Dr Paul Marsden who presented his latest thinking at a WOMMA UK event last week.
Marsden is certainly not alone in his line of thought. Marketing Week says ‘forget e-commerce; social commerce is where it’s at’ whereas Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg said ‘if I had to guess social commerce is the next area to really blow up.’
So what is social commerce exactly? Well according to IBM it’s ‘the concept of word of word of mouth applied to e-commerce’. Or, put another way, social media plus shopping.
The premise behind social commerce is an interesting one. As a rule, people like to shop together. Together we feel that we make better shopping decisions, using what Marsden calls social intelligence, based on the advice and opinions of other.
It’s fair to say that customer reviews sections on e-commerce sites are certainly nothing new, but that said there is plenty of evidence to suggest that brands are beginning to up their game. iTunes, for example, has introduced the social network Ping with its latest software update, enabling its customers to recommend and share music with their friends.
Dell on the other hand has generated more than $8 million in sales by enabling its customers to access exclusive deals through a dedicated Twitter feed – DellOutlet – whereas Diesel Spain has introduced social networking capabilities to its fitting rooms so that shoppers can upload pictures direct to their Facebook newsfeed – enabling them to share their shopping experience with their friends in real-time.
With all this in mind it’s a pretty safe bet that we’re going to see an increasing number of brands turning to social commerce over the coming months as a way of engaging with their customers, whilst demonstrating tangible ROI.
