comScore cites that in Q1, 2012, digital content and subscriptions, computer software, consumer electronics, jewelry and watches and event tickets were the most popular online product purchases. Also, 48.8% of e-commerce transactions included free shipping, the highest ever outside of a holiday shopping season. During the Q1 period, 38% of tablet users bought something online, with clothing being the most popular items. While its been reported that many retailers lack online storefronts optimized for shopping via a tablet device, U.S. consumers have come to expect a sort of integrated shopping experience, spanning smartphones, tablets, desktops and physical, brick-and-mortar retail storefronts. Online retail for tablet optimization is advancing, and a higher percentage of tablet-based purchases should be expected.

comScore chairman Gian Fulgoni states, “The first quarter of this year was especially strong for retail e-commerce as we returned to year-over-year growth rates in the high teens, numbers we haven’t seen since 2007 – While the economic recovery continues to be painfully slow, the channel shift to e-commerce appears to be accelerating. This presents opportunities but also challenges for brick-and-mortar retailers if they can’t hold onto their offline market share in the digital world.”

An undesired effect of a sort of digital window shopping are instances of consumers using brick-and-mortar showrooms to get a hands-on look at items they’d shopped for online. This practice is one of the reasons why Best Buy has been closing stores. Customers have begun plainly using big box lo
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As a result, 8thBridge began working on a new social commerce platform called Graphite, which launched this week. Wade Gerten, the CEO of 8thBridge, spoke to WebProNews and told us that this new tool doesn’t focus on pushing shoppers to Facebook brand stores, but instead, it focuses on the existing channels shoppers use.

“What Graphite enables us to do, for the first time, is take those social shopping experiences and let them run in your existing channels, so in your website, in your brick and mortar store, through mobile apps, and any other channel,” he said.

The platform, which was built with Facebook’s Custom Open Graph, specifically integrates with existing brand sites. Retailers can include customized buttons beyond the “like” to include action verbs such as “love,” “want,” “need,” and more. In other words, the role of Facebook in Graphite is more for social discovery and information about products.

Gerten told us that the new social commerce platform has benefits for both consumers and brands. For consumers, it provides a better shopping experience and doesn’t take them out of their comfort zone. When a user presses one of the customized buttons on an ecommerce site, the action is displayed on his Facebook Timeline for his friends to see.

From a brand’s perspective, there are also many opportunities. According to Gerten, the majority of shopping on Facebook over the last year has consisted of sharing a product with another friend, not actual purchases.

“From a brand’s point of view, what it brings you is a much more powerful way to engage in social commerce,” he said.

“It’s that person-to-person sharing that drives social commerce,” Gerten added.

Gerten did point out that Graphite does not allow brands to push offers to consumers. On the other hand, it creates a more natural shopping experience for both the retailer and the consumer. With this model, he believes ecommerce revenues will increase.

“We think it’s the time when social commerce really starts to put some real revenue numbers on the board,” he said.

This new era of social commerce that Graphite brings is a drastic transformation from the early days of ecommerce that essentially consisted of a digital copy of a brand’s catalog. Gerten believes that, by shaping ecommerce around people as Graphite does, the resulting experience is more closely related to offline shopping.

At launch, some of 8thBridge Graphite’s partners include Ticketmaster, American Apparel, Hallmark, Elle, and Oscar de la Renta. Gerten did tell us that the company would be announcing more brands in the very near future.

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One of the biggest financial failures for online retailers or service providers occurs when consumers visit their sites , create a guest account and leave without purchasing the items or services left in their shopping carts. Essentially, they shopped, but didn’t buy. Logging in and engaging brands via social networking sites offers a unique opportunity for these retailers to find out why you didn’t purchase, offer you a special promotion, and in many cases, see what other products you may have been interested in.

Sites like pinterest, Twitter, G+, Linkedin, and Facebook allow both the user and the retailer to benefit from mutually shared information. We can search for reviews and products specs, and they can search for novel ways to get us to buy. This next infographic from Monetate.Com gives us the lowdown on how getting logged in on social sites brings more value to ecommerce and the consumer. It’s worth taking a look at.

(click to enlarge)

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This infographic from KISSmetrics explores some of the underlying emotional factors that influence purchase decisions and discusses ways to build these into your visitors’ online experience. These range from:

• keeping it simple and reducing users options by narrowing choices through the shopping and buying process
• positioning your products as being the ‘safe’ tried and tested option rather than a new choice
• creating a fantastic first impression
• providing social proof that other people like and buy your product.

(Click image to enlarge)

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According to research compiled by data-driven social media marketing company Argyle Social (a sponsor of this blog, and the software that we use for social communication), 65-66% of 566 online retailers surveyed only post content about their own company on their Facebook pages.

With the release/forced march of the new Timeline format, Zuckerberg’s brigade is mandating an end to the “me” “me” “me” era of Facebook communication. The lack of default landing tabs, the prohibition of promotional items on Cover images, and the prominent display of friends’ interactions with the brand combine to put something other than commerce and calls-to-action at the forefront of the Facebook Page experience…….emotion. (See 14 Ways new Facebook Betrays Small Business)

In an excellent piece on VentureBeat, ace tech journalist Jolie O’Dell quotes Facebook design lead Sam Lessin as saying:

“(Timeline is about) the whole concept that organizations have identities, that a nonprofit, a sports team, all have identities that they want to express.”

About the new Cover photos, and in particular Facebook’s ban against promotional messaging in them, Lessin said:

“The key with cover photos is storytelling and expression. We want to create a good experience for everyone, and we think these guidelines really help brands… They’re encouraging people to create engaging content that people want to come back to and create and emotional connection with.”

Perhaps the most underreported and puzzling statement about Timeline was this gem from Facebook project director Gokul Rajaram:

“Brands don’t want to be overly promotional; in the long-term, they know it’s a turn-off to people… They want to have a deeper connection.”

Why Would We Want to Make Money When We Can “Engage”?

I’m not sure I agree that brands don’t want to be overly promotional, or that they inherently want to have a deeper connection. Brands want to be successful, period.

If direct mailing miniature bags of popcorn carefully scented with a special fragrance formulated by Angelina Jolie herself proved to be effective, brands would be all over that tactic like a feral cat on an unguarded ham. In fact, as the infographic below suggests, two-thirds of online retailers on Facebook are almost purely promotional.

It’s perhaps more accurate to state that some people (including me) believe that being too promotional on Facebook is a slippery slope and can ultimately fray the relationship with customers. Facebook seems to agree (in spades) because they have decreed that brands must embrace the photo-centric, feel-good ethos of Timeline.

Facebook is on record as saying that its goal is to have brands act and interact just like people, and if your company wants to actually make money from Facebook? Well, there’s a whole bunch of advertising options available for that.

Jolie O’Dell nailed it in the summary of her article:

Marketers love and live by calls to action, so if calls to action are illegal in Page cover photos but legal in Facebook ads, marketers will still be shelling out for Facebook ads to the tune of billions each year.

Many business owners struggle with their usage of social networking sites to bring new customers, or to keep existing ones. As a matter of fact, they try to use social media as an advertising tool. Social media can be a marketing tool if used the right way, but what is the right way? And how relevant is it to use social media for advertising?

The answer for the latter question is not at all; there is a much bigger image, a culture might I say, when it comes to social media. Understanding this culture and how it operates is essential to the understanding of ways to connect with consumers more effectively. Reading some statistics will help us understand some phenomena and trends in the usage of social networking sites.

Compete studied how consumers are embracing social media as an online marketing tool, and showed results that are interesting.

Businesses should not focus too much on selling their products via facebook or twitter because 60% of consumers never use social media for shopping. This tells us that businesses shouldn’t try to sell or advertise the product or service directly via social media; consumers are embracing change very slowly on this one.

However, 68% of respondents visit retailers’ facebook page to keep up to date with sales and promotions. Great!

Now we have a general image about how social media is a new whole culture for marketing that emphasises the human side. Following are a few tips to using social media for ecommerce:

1- To sell or not to sell? Just because 60% of consumers never use social media for shopping, does not always translate to forget about having a shop available on social media. This might be exactly what your business needs. As a matter of fact, 1-800-Flowers allows customers to purchase flowers by being the first to embrace the idea of having a shop on facebook. This is one direct way to promote your business, however, you can sell indirectly by updating customers about best-sellers and new products.

2- Don’t forget to be human. Business entities should keep in mind that customers are people, developing connections with other people rather than a business. This is where social media plays its role, and where business should forget about itself for a little bit and reflect on what the customers have to say. The subject of a business showing the human side is a long discussion, and to sum it all up in a few words, following are a few tactics to help show the human side of the business:

Use images of people (ie. customer service representatives, satisfied customers, etc.) on your social networking site rather than the business’s logo.

Use a human tone when trying to converse with customers.

Give feedback and comments in case a customer criticizes your business.

3- Stimulate senses with video. Adding videos to your social media strategy is an effective way to improve sales. Customers like to know a product personally and in action, and videos are a great way to demonstrate your products. By having videos on youtube, you also allow customers to share your videos and embed them on their social pages, increasing clicks and hopefully customer base.

4- Social time as part of the job. A business is now able to allocate sales revenue from social media, and once the business is hooked to social media, it must keep up with it. That is, a frequent and regular maintenance of your social pages is necessary for the success of your business. You can schedule time for yourself and your marketing staff to spend on social networking sites, converse with customers, and read their comments and reply to them. Distribute these times throughout the day so that you show customers that you care about them.

5- Don’t always try to sell. Customers are not always interested in buying your product, but especially on social media, they are more interested in hearing your story, reading about what makes you special, etc. Use social media to tell stories about your entity, stories about your products, news, statistics with regards to your business, and some other content related to your business.

6- Make the customer feel special. Glenn and Beal call it “exclusivity,” which refers to offering special coupons and discounts available only to those customers subscribed to your pages on social media. That is a great way to keep current customers, and it encourages new customers to join your social network.

Does your user interface lead nowhere?

I went Christmas shopping online for a computer armoire. I knew exactly what I wanted because I had done previous research on the manufacturer and pricing. The specific piece I wanted was sold out on every top brand department store that had advertised a low price for the item.

Next, I searched in Google for the item by brand name and product description. My expectation was that the company that makes the computer armoire would come up and Google would show me the actual product pages itself so I could get right to it. I was wrong. The manufacturer’s website not only didn’t appear in the natural search results, it also didn’t show up in any paid placement areas of the search results page. How odd for a name brand company not to have their own website rank well, I thought.

Google presented me with all the major department stores that sold the computer armoire that I had already spent an hour checking that were all dead ends. So, thinking this was strange, I searched directly by the name of the company who makes the furniture item I wanted to buy. Perhaps they still had some in stock.

No such luck! They don’t sell their own products! All their web site does is let you search for stores that do. I entered my zip code and their search results brought back no results. However, I already own this piece of furniture. I bought it down the road. I would have done so again, but they were sold out. Not only does this furniture company not sell their own merchandise, they don’t do any promotion of their resellers. There is no time savings device to take potential customers to any reseller who may still have the item in stock. This was a complete dead end. In the days of personalization and communication, this is unacceptable.

Rather than give up, I searched Google with the exact product number and manufacturer as my search phrase. My expectation was that someone, somewhere on the planet, must have this piece of furniture for sale. I was even willing to pay a higher price if someone could prove they had one in stock. I would even DRIVE to pick it up if it was at a store nearby.

Google brought up many excellent search results for me. It didn’t take me long to realize they were all distributors of this particular piece of furniture. I was delighted to discover the first site I visited had what I wanted. Or did they?

They couldn’t tell me whether or not it was in stock. Taking a chance, I began to go down the purchase path to order it. It allowed me to proceed as a “guest”. I was able to add the product to a shopping cart. However, it never told me if they had it. Since everyone else was sold out, I didn’t feel confident they had the item in stock either. I got as far as the address and billing phase, but stopped because not only did I not know if they had the item, they weren’t about to inform me if it would arrive before Christmas or could be expedited to do so. When I looked around for other clues, I realized there was no log in area for customers, no way to track orders and no payment method offered ahead of time. There was no indication whatsoever they even knew I was there trying to place an order. This is because there were no user instructions, no welcoming content, no confirmation of data received and no online presence that anyone was behind the curtain.

I left that site and tried 4 others. In each case, it was a distributor. In every single case, they used the same third party shopping cart process, suggesting to me that the manufacturer supplies it to their resellers. Not a single one of these resellers could tell me if the product would or could be delivered by Christmas, was in stock or could be tracked. I never bought the item. For the major department stores that did sell the item, they never established whether or not they would re-stock the item. There was no way for me to be notified if they did. So here I am. A customer shopping online, prepared with money and the exact item I want, and I’m unable to buy it from the manufacturer themselves or any of their resellers.

What Are Some Lessons Here?

1. Searchers are smart. They do their research before searching and will search by exact product descriptions, model numbers, manufacturer, brand name, and even down to exact measurements and other specifications. Make sure your web site is optimized accordingly.
2. If you offer any third party application, be it a shopping cart or travel reservations, you MUST test it to be sure it works functionally and is designed to sell. Just because a manufacturer gives you a free cart in no way means they gave you one that will earn you revenue.
3. If your order process shows an “Out of Stock” message, and you want the customer to return again or have any faith in your business whatsoever, show them how to find out when it will be re-stocked. If any of these stores would have re-stocked in a week, I still could have ordered and picked it up at a nearby physical store in time for Christmas.
4. No guidance, no interaction, no sale.
5. Remember your target market and especially the “Last minute holiday shopper” user persona.
6. Don’t rely on resellers to sell for you if you don’t support them with usable applications and a well ranked web site of your own.

I did have good experiences with NetShops and Amazon. I’ll return to them again because they made purchasing online a pleasure and hassle free. And, they were prepared for last minute holiday shoppers like me with ship date deadlines, last minute crunch time specials and alternatives to out of stock items.

In other words, they knew I was coming and they were ready for me. That’s the best usability lesson of all.

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Why?

Well, for many people, shopping online is still dabbling in the unknown. If they buy something from a High Street store, they can speak with staff, see the product, pay for it and take it away there and then.

But shopping online is a completely different experience:

•    There is no one to ask questions of immediately
•    The can see a picture of the product but not the real thing
•    They can’t touch the product
•    Although they can pay for it, they have to wait for it to be delivered

Effectively, they are giving a faceless company their hard earned cash for something they’ve not yet received.

It’s hardly surprising so many online transactions are never completed.

Don’t lose sales through ‘what if…’ syndrome

What do I mean?

•    What if I can’t get back to the webpage I want if I click this link?
•    What if I don’t like the product when it arrives?
•    What if the company goes bust?
•    What if they sell my details on to another company?

These are just a few of the ‘what ifs…’ that could be flying through your customers’ heads right now.

So how can you alleviate their fears?

How can you make them feel safe while shopping with you?

Give reassurance every step of the way

The key is to reassure them at every stage of the buying process – from the moment they land on your website, right through to their sale confirmation email.

1. Testimonials

An old one, but a good one. Showing real customer testimonials on your website will help reassure your customers. If they can see other people were satisfied with your products and service, they are more likely to buy.

If you don’t have any, get some. Ask past customers to rate your service.

2. Privacy policy

People are, quite rightly, concerned about the possibility of their details being passed on to third parties.

Reassure them this won’t happen by telling them and providing a prominent link to your privacy policy.

3. Simple ordering

If you want someone to buy from you, your ordering process must be simple. And I don’t just mean so you can understand it.

People of all IT abilities are going to be potential customers, so when you design your ordering process, get your Aunt or other member of the family (non-tech savvy) to do a dry run for you. This ‘test drive’ will help you iron out any ambiguities.

4. Reputable payment

People don’t like to input their sensitive information online, such as bank details and card numbers. Give reassurance by only using reputable payment partners.

5. Guarantee

Everyone loves a guarantee, especially the ‘100% of your money back, no questions asked’ type. It shows your commitment to your customers and your faith in your products.

6. Let them know where you are

There’s nothing more off putting than seeing a website without an address.

If you are genuine, surely there’s no reason to hide your postal address.

7. Click points

All over your website there’ll be various ‘click’ points for navigation. Do a full review of them (call in your Aunt again) and make sure they are all clear. If not, add a line of text to explain what your customer needs to do.

8. Awards

If you have won awards for customer service or for your products, display them on your website. Sight of those will provide an extra layer of confidence for your customers, making them more likely to buy.

There you go, 8 very simple ways you can avoid the ‘what if…’ syndrome.

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First, and foremost, your site’s general focus should be around your deals. If people have to go digging for savings on your site, there’s a good chance they’ll simply go elsewhere. Change your headers, titles, and banners to reflect the huge savings consumers can enjoy by shopping at your site.

Keep in mind landing pages when optimizing your site as well. People will most likely be searching for specific items, and associated deals. If you have specific items people are mostly searching for when visiting your site, be sure you give these pages extra attention. Again, if they have to go beyond one or two pages to search for a deal then they’ll most likely leave.

Along with optimization, highlight the convenience of purchasing from your website. “Saving time” was the prime motivator for 77% of consumers who purchase online. “Avoiding crowds” followed closely behind. Use these small bits of psychological advantages to close sales on your website.

More and more, people are using social media networks to search for deals. It makes sense when you think about it; the most up-to-date news can generally be found on Twitter. It’s vital that you make your deals for Black Friday/Cyber Monday known among the social networks. If you have an email newsletter setup, send out specific deals to targeted subscribers.

Another small nugget to go along with the general social media presence, is to highlight specific deals on different platforms. It’s difficult to receive a visit from a social media platform, let alone close a sale. Try and devise special deals which provide even more cost-saving benefits to consumers coming from the likes of Twitter and Facebook.

Your website is going to see a large uptick in sales. How big this increase is will be dependent no how you’re able to leverage your deals, and let them be known to the online consumer base. Following these small set of tips is a good start.