Video: Jo Lyall from Mindshare on Sticky Stories, Purchasing Paths – #AdVision – Microsoft Advertising Blog – Microsoft Advertising Community

Video: Jo Lyall from Mindshare on Sticky Stories, Purchasing Paths – #AdVision – Microsoft Advertising Blog – Microsoft Advertising Community.

S-commerce, it’s better together

2010 saw the rise of social buying models and plugins to change the retail landscape.  Will 2011 be the year of S-Commerce?

We have always been influenced by our friends and networks when we buy new products, now social platforms are offering retailers a golden opportunity to bring the group shopping experience into every online purchase.

Whilst I sit at my computer browsing the latest collections on my favourite shopping websites I reminded, that whilst I am sitting here alone, my friends and their valuable opinions are just a click away.

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The last decade of web enabled living has empowered consumers be more informed, better advised and to achieve better pricing.  The value of the e-commerce channel has seen exponential growth with £250bn spent by UK consumers between 2000 and 2010.  In 2010 alone an estimated £56bn was spent online.  46% of UK consumers claim to shop online at least once per week.  Much of this was driven by items under £100.  For higher ticket purchases the internet has played a valuable role in driving offline purchase.  Over 2010 we have seen a new and very powerful trend emerge around Social-Commerce.  Where smart and brave retailers have capitalised on the moment in time where a consumer most wants to learn from the experience of the people they trust; their friends and people they consider to-have authority.  This, has been achieved by connecting where we buy and buying where we connect. i.e. taking commerce to social platforms like Facebook and taking Facebook technology onto retailer sites.

Social-commerce is born out of innate human behaviour

S-commerce is about making your business more sharable, connected, rewarding and personal.  Allowing the consumer to see your product in their world and to be rewarded for buying from you will bring greater referrals, advocacy and ultimately increased sales.  S-commerce thinking can drive both direct and indirect sales.  Directly through short-term incentive sites and platforms or through reward for fans or followers and indirectly through connecting the shopping experience to an individuals social network to encourage recommendation.  S-commerce allows business to benefit from innate human behaviours.  We all have mental rules of thumb that help us make purchase decisions and social technology is designed to capaitalise on this:

• Other people are doing it: we are reassured by other peoples actions, if they are buying then maybe we should too. E.g. Amazon, Facebook Likes
• Scarcity: Short term deals, group buying, deal networks and feeds keep us informed with the latest offers. E.g. Groupon, Voucher Cloud
• Authority: Referrals, recommendations by believable experts, and community tested products
• Relevance: If is a product is positioned as relevant to my lifestyle we are more likely to purchase.  If we can shop together with ‘someone’ like me we are also more likely to purchase.
• Reciprocity: If we can perform an action and gain benefit for both ourselves and a friend it plays to our need to be fair.
• Liking: We are more likely to like something if someone else we like agrees.  Giving us tools that full this need drives purchase.  E.g. Follow, Like, Share buttons on websites allow us to both demonstrate what we like to our community and to ask for their feedback.

The new model for driving impulse e-purchase

Deal sites around the world gained significant traction over 2010, including; Groupon, Living Social, Woot, KGB, Foursquare rewards and most recently Facebook deals.  In the US 44 million visited a deal site in November 2010.  2.5 million UK users visited Groupon in just one month alone, with a further 4.5 subscribing to their email database.  The majority of the deals available have been around low cost items, treatments or experiences across both well-known and independent brands.  The Groupon model relies on communities getting together to purchase, the offer is only released when enough members pledge to buy.  The Groupons drive both revenue and footfall since many of the deals require instore activation.  The Facebook model rewards locality and loyalty through incentivised ‘checkins’.  It is easy to imagine why low cost products like coffee, tickets for experiences like Thorpe Park and double value vouchers for GAP and Amazon work on these platforms.  However, make no mistake these platforms are also powerful enough to sell high cost products like cars.  Mazda were a UK launch partner for Facebook Deals and in China 1 Mercedes was sold per minute on the group buy site Taobao. The connected digital and real world mechanism can take advantage of the ROPO (research online purchase offline) behaviour that is now well established into our shopping behaviours.

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Social commerce is undoubtedly changing the face of retail, arguably for the better.  It is becoming more consumer centric, more personalised and better connected giving retailers a new approach to CRM that drives sales and advocacy.  On the downside for retailers it will further expose brands that don’t live up to their promises or who don’t recognise the importance and power of both community and technology to change their businesss.

Some of these ideas and platforms will just be part of the journey to a more socially orientated retail world and may fall by the wayside or evolve into something new, others and certainly some ‘social actions’ will be here to stay.  A social action is value exchange that consumer is learning to have between a brand and themselves which rewards loyalty and advocacy by giving something back. In 2011 consumers want the best deal and the reward for spreading the word, now surely that has to be worth testing….

The New Year DAWN event

The DAWN team have planned an event for February 9th focusing on work and life balance. This event is aimed all women working in the digital media industry who are looking to be inspired and network with like-minded people. Places are selling out fast so if you are interested sign up now. http://dawnlondon.eventbrite.com

Never wear flip flops or make the tea

This might seem like a strange post for my blog but hopefully by the end you will see why it is relevant.  Have you ever met DAWN? If you work in Digital media in the UK then she might just be your most influential new friend….

D.A.W.N (Digital Advertising Womens Network) launched officially tonight after 9 months of planning over coffee and croisants with our first event.  The theme of the event focused on the importance of building networks around you to succeed in your career and in life in general.  We had four wonderful speakers; Sonian  Sudhakar (head of online at Virgin), Pippa Glucklich (MD of Arena Media), Leigh Smyth (MD Race Online) and Nickie Smith (Marketing Director Microsoft) who all shared their experiences and ideas for how to go further as a women in Media.  The turn out was brilliant and the vibe on the night was positive, I think DAWN is here to stay.  After hearing people speak honestly and openly about their experiences there is no way you can come away feeling anything but inspired.  Here are some of my favourite advice gems from the night

• Don’t be afraid of technology. if you don’t understand it find someone who does and be their friend
• Women should be more confident in their ability, men tend to blag far more!
• Never be afraid to ask a question
• Build a network around you, it will help you take risks and be there to catch you
• Think of yourself as a brand and invest that in that brand as often as possible: network, learn, reflect and turn up
• Word has it that men spend 70% of their time thinking about their next career move and 30% thinking about the job in hand, for women it is more 100% the job they have now… we can learn something from that
• Women embrace your impostor syndrome… you are supposed to be there and you do deserve your job.  As the book says, feel the fear and do it anyway
• Get a mentor or mentors –  have people to turn to for advice, especially someone outside of your immediate company for an objective POV
• Never wear flip flops (even though some are really nice) just think about the message you give by how you look and don’t take this too literally!
• Don’t make the tea, or certainly not every time, resist that inner female urge
• Give something back, help other women around you achieve their goals, you will learn something for yourself from every one of these experiences
• Set your ambitions high and work on something that motivates you
• Ask people around you how they perceive you, ask for feedback, use the mirrors to see yourself through others eyes
• The right attitude will get you places faster, be positive  and enthusiastic about what you are going to embark on
• Some days you might drown but others will be plain sailing, embrace both
• Be dedicated, trustworthy and reliable
• Balance home and work life and recognise the people around you who help make it possible to have it all
• Stretch yourself, explore new avenues, take a risk.. it might just become your greatest attribute
• Always try to see your world through different lenses, it is probably bigger, better and brighter than you think, if not change something
• Know what your talent is and understand your worth so you can help others see your value

DAWN will be many things but most importantly it will create a connection between like minded people in the digital media industry, this connection can be felt in the real world at events but can also be experienced everyday through technology.  DAWN is active now on Facebook and Linked In, how influential can she be….?  and men before you get upset about being excluded, DAWN is open to men as well under the banner of DAN, so watch this space.

Yeo Valley, paid, owned and earned

If like me you love the X-factor then you will have probably witnessed the new feature length Yeo Valley TV ad.  I am not quite sure how I feel about the ad itself but it got my attention and stopped me leaving the room.  At the end of the ad it said search for Yeo Valley and I did… The google results served up an interesting combination of ‘owned’ and earned.  Top of the list was a blog post from Hippy Shopper talking about the new ad, then came live twitter comments and below that the natural link to the Yeo Valley website.  Twitscoop showed Yeo trending alongside Cheryl, X-factor and the contestants so people were definitely talking about the ad.  Mixed views over whether or not people loved the ad and whether it was original but that aside I think this was a smart move for a brand this to get cut through by using a combination of POE. Now, what they do next is critical, they have got some consumer attention so will they reveal the next part of the story of ‘down on the farm’ or have they spent all the money on one ad in one spot….

Just because you can build it does not mean that you should

Why didn’t google wave work? In my opinion when technology leads development without a clear consumer need success is much less likely and the developer community are not a great proxy for mass behaviour. Google wave appears to be a victim of this problem.

On the whole most adults don’t want to be part of an ongoing recorded conversation with the ability to work seamlessly on documents together, we are just not that evolved. On the other hand the younger generation can’t get enough of BBM and Whats App which gives them an always on direct line to their friends. So maybe wave just peaked to early.

BBC article

An iPad is not going to make councils better at their jobs

I don’t usually blog about government related issues but I am literally incensed by an article that I have just read about Leicester council buying ipads for their councillors. One the staff were quoted saying that if a constituent approached them on a street with a problem they would be able to start dealing with it straight away via their iPad, can anyone really imagine that being true, what was he planning on doing…. Google it? the constituent has probably already tried that. So if you live in Leicester look out for Ross Grant and his shiny new toy.

If the councils want to appear more up to date and improve the efficiency and work flow I am not convinced an iPad will be the solution.

I am a big believer in technology improving business output but an iPad is the finishing touch not the starting point.

If they believe it will help them so much why not buy themselves one rather than spending out taxes on it!? I work in the digital industry and I bought my own, I don’t expect my company to buy me it for me (maybe i’m the fool!).

Blown away

So you already know that I think that flipboard is pretty cool but this morning I am literally blown away by the Facebook and Twitter integration. Flipboard accesses your accounts and pulls in the latest posts, photos, tweets, links and then publishes it into a magazine format. You have to see it to truly get how impressive this is. If you don’t have an iPad find someone who does and check it out. With personal publishing like this traditional options continue to become less significant in my world. Any publisher putting up pay walls or barriers to their content should think about what technology like flipboard means to their business.

my iPad

This my first blog post via my iPad, is it very sad that I am excited? Probably but I embrace the geek inside me. I have spent a few hours browsing the available apps working out what I want. So far I have big oven, FT, iBook and kindle. I am debating downloading the times app but 9.99 seems quite a lot so i am undecided. I thought I would just use it for browsing web and watching video or viewing pics but I can see why it is also good for presentations, I think pages will be my next download. Pictures look stunning on here, I have been looking at my wedding photos, the iPad is the perfect portable album. It is actually really nice to type on, you could definitely do long hand work on here that you can’t do on an iPhone. Now my next job is to choose a secret code to lock my iPad with to stop my husband taking over, i have only been home a few hours and he has already called it ‘our iPad’, I think not…