Long before the Internet, people shared product opinions with friends and family through word-of-mouth. Today, social media tools enable consumers to extend their connections and conduct commerce in powerful new ways. And even though surveys find that people join social networks mainly to communicate with friends, an increasing amount of that socializing relates to sharing product and brand opinions.
As people spend more time on social networks, retailers feel pressure to be there as well. Most large online retailers have a presence on Facebook. Twitter is a hotbed of experimentation for retailers that see it as a channel for customer service, promoting the deal of the day and more. Facebook and its third-party developers are creating e-commerce applications on the site.
In the future, retailers will emphasize marketing to their most influential customers. Right now, they only have a limited picture of who their influential customers are on social networks and how they share opinions. Firms that can help retailers analyze the customer data they collect from social media sites will be in demand.
Key questions this report answers:
What is the outlook for social commerce?
How are marketers engaging customers on social media sites?
What social shopping features are retailers adding to their sites?
Which retailers are paving the way in social commerce?
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