Are you a Connector, a Salesman or a Maven?

If you are one of the above, then marketing agencies should be following your every move. Gartner has studied how certain people influence their social network in buying decisions. 

Gartner has categorized people into five buckets depending on the role they play in Social Networks -

• Connectors - have many people in their network and introduce people
• Salesmen - have many people in their network and are persuaders
• Mavens - are subject experts
• Seekers - reach out for buying advice
• Self-Sufficient - are researchers who make up their own mind

It is particularly interesting that 20% of the population is one of three - Connectors, Salesmen or Mavens. It is this 20% that influences 74% of the population in their shopping decisions. 

 

Here is the link to the article if you want to learn more.

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So have you got the Fifth P?

An Altimeter Group report focuses on the 4 P's of marketing, namely Product, Price, Promotion and Position, to bring businesses closer to success in the world of social commerce. 

Brian Solis, a highly recognized new media marketing guru and author of the new book Engage!, has introduced a fifth P in this equation - People. I completely agree with Brian that it is the people dimension which will truly differentiate social media marketing from traditional marketing and commerce strategies. We are moving towards a people driven market where the collective power of the community will drive sales. Brian puts it very succinctly - "It’s your responsibility to not only focus on the aspects of “paying it backward,” i.e. pay me for my goods and services, but also “paying it forward,” the investment in your community so that brands merit resonance through relevance."

Businesses need to evolve a social media strategy in order to engage the social consumer and convert conversations to commerce. Perhaps, it suffices to say that Businesses need a way to connect the 'Shopping Gods' with 'Newbies'.

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Now Search is turning Social

Jenna Wortham at The New York Times  says "Now, even on the Internet, it is not what you know but who you know." With this statement I think Jenna has hit the nail firmly on its head. This is what we truly believe at ShopSocially and it seems to become more and more obvious to everyone on the internet. In the past, if we wanted an opinion or a review about something we informally polled our friends, neighbors and colleagues. From this we evolved to using search engines to get information about everything under the sun. Now the wheel is turning a full circle with leading researchers and Search companies suggesting that getting results from our immediate social network will make search results more relevant. This is the new wave and it is here to stay. The multitude of social recommendation engines are proof. We believe that this will have an effect on not just search, but our whole lifestyle from where we shop, eat, spend our holidays etc. 

Click here to read the full article.

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Interesting Article on Importance of Social Merchandising by Sam Decker

"Today's shoppers don't go to a store to determine which TV they want - they already know which product they want when they arrive." says Sam Decker, Chief Marketing Officer at Bazaarvoice. We at ShopSocially, have been talking about how the online market place needs new tools to leverage the power of social recommendations. In his article on ClickZ, Sam explains how traditional merchandising efforts don't translate to the web and that shoppers don't trust traditional marketing material anymore and want to hear from people like them. He has dissected the process which shoppers use to buy products online into three simple phases - Discovery, Choice and Validation/ Confidence. Discovery can start at the search engine but more recently seems to begin at social networking sites. Shoppers read reviews and stories from "poeple like them" to make or reduce choices. Finally, validation occurs by reaching out to a network of friends before making the final purchase.

Click here to read the entire article.

Posted via email from ShopSocially Blog