Posts Tagged ‘retailing on Facebook’

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Time reporter Dan Fletcher recently tried to use Facebook as his florist, with mixed results.

He chronicled his adventure in a piece titled:
Gift Giving on Facebook Gets Real

This tongue in check portrayal illustrates the challenges that retailers will have as they attempt to move from virtual gift selling to the real deal on Facebook.

Dan attempted to use a Facebook application to purchase and deliver some actual roses to three women on his “gift list”.

In the end, only his mother would take the roses from him, and here is why…

Facebook is not designed to be a convenience store. If retailers are looking for another distribution channel like 7/11, they will fail in this space. Purchasing convenience is not what social networker’s need when they come to Facebook. They are there for something different.

Facebook is a friend and family gathering system with the potential of being a fabulous retailing format. It can be the perfect place for passing out real gifts to people who WANT to stay connected. But the key is not the convenience of the purchase; rather it is the simplification of the gift sharing process. Even then the sharing must be a part of the engaging conversation within the Facebook experience. Retailers who can facilitate the sharing of gifts within these walls will find the gift selling process simplified.

Facebook is more like a party than a convenience store. Retailers who can inject a fun atmosphere of a group activity within the gift giving process will fit the Facebook model perfectly.

Until Dan’s real flowers can join the Facebook party, they will wilt in the delivery box.

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PartyWeDo
The AlbinoPhant Creators
Your Party 2.0 Specialists

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The conversation and measurements concerning retailing on Facebook and other social networks continues. There seems to a bubbling desire to discover a way to introduce real-world retailing into these virtual words.

So far most of the measurement tools have relied on popularity measurements, such as which brands can garner the most fans. Most marketers realize that fan count and real product consumption are miles apart when converting eyeballs into cash.

Heather Dougherty, Director of Research at Hitwise, posted some interesting details on the amount of traffic that social media sources have sent to major retail websites. It seems that there is a growing number of social networker’s who want to at least continue to engage with brands from Facebook and simular forums.

Heather suggests, “one common question regarding the relationship between social networks and retailers is how to be sure that the traffic coming from social networks is not just a by-product of their popularity.”

Adding to this concern is the reality that retailers have not yet found a way to actually retail on the pages of Facebook. This Hitwise study only demonstrates how well social networks have been in pointing users toward the brand’s online or offline presence.

Eric Eldon added his commentary on the Hitwise report when he said:…”most retailers are still experimenting with a variety of approaches to building a presence inside Facebook.” He also suggested that some retailers are beginning to find ways to directly sell goods to users.

It is hard to measure the effects on retailing from these networks, but most agree that the actual sale of product within these networks has fallen short of what it could be. Brand popularity pages have become nothing more than another type of advertising presentation to the many Facebook users.

Retailers will need to do more than use the networks to make themselves more popular in order to build revenue from Facebook. They must find ways to engage users in the purchasing process with a group of their friends. Then Facebook could be used to organize great shopping experiences and then mimic the fun of sharing a purchase with others.

Once a retailer develops the group shopping experience, they will have a selling machine like none other, rather than a virtual extension of a popularity contest.

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PartyWeDo
The AlbinoPhant Creators
Your Party 2.0 Specialists