Is Social Commerce the Next Great Thing?

Social commerce is the e-commerce transactions in realtime, leveraging social media networks and within the apps. Social commerce stems from early features around peer-to-peer platforms, e.g., the early versions of Marketplace by Facebook in early 2000. It has started to gain traction on major social media platforms in recent years. Some notable examples include Instagram's Checkout, Facebook Shop, WhatsApp Catalog, and Pinterest Pins.

Traditionally, social media platforms were mainly leveraged to raise brand awareness, provide shopping ideas, influence purchasing decisions, and direct the traffic to the official websites or third-party platforms (e.g., Amazon.com) for customers to place an order. 

Social commerce makes it possible that customers, when attracted by certain products while browsing their social media feeds, could place an order within the app in real-time. In this way, it saves time for customers to switch apps, sign in, and check out, and customers are more likely to complete the purchase instead of abandoning it on second thoughts during the traditional lengthy process. Social commerce also drives user stickiness and retention for social media platforms.

Challenges exist on its way to become the "next great thing". Customer adoption is a major one. The social commerce boom has been driven heavily by the younger generation, according to a study by MarketingWeek. The percentage of willingness to buy through social commerce is at its peak for younger generations (18- to 24-years-olds) and drops extremely quickly for elder age groups. Such observation is partly a result of the product catalog currently available on social commerce, mainly apparel, accessories, makeup, home, etc. Therefore, how to increase the adoption of social media in other age groups and broaden the product catalog available for social media are key questions to answer in order to make it the next great thing.

Tracking every ad buy for Super Bowl LV

• Doritos taps Jimmy Kimmel, Mindy Kaling for mysterious spot

Doritos released a teaser for its Super Bowl spot, which will promote the return of its 3D Crunch product, per details emailed to Marketing Dive. Featuring Jimmy Kimmel and Mindy Kaling, the video features a cliffhanger about the star of the ad's "new look" and ends with the cryptic #FlatMatthew hashtag.

Doritos' sister brand Cheetos is also relying on a celebrity, Ashton Kutcher, and a mystery to build buzz for its Super Bowl spot. Parent company Frito-Lay will run three ads during the big game.

• Cheetos teases in-game spot with Ashton Kutcher

Cheetos returns to the game this year with an ad highlighting the recently released Cheetos Crunch Pop Mix, a mashup of its Cheetos Crunchy and Cheetos Popcorn products, per an announcement.

A teaser video stars actor Ashton Kutcher, who's shocked as he flips through black-and-white photos mysteriously sent to him with an empty bag of the new snack. The clip concludes with the date of the Super Bowl, hinting that the mystery will be solved in Cheetos' in-game commercial.

• Super Bowl newcomer Vroom dramatizes pain of car buying

Online auto dealer Vroom is making its Super Bowl debut with a 30-second ad that dramatizes the frustrating process of buying a car, per details emailed to Marketing Dive. Created with agency Anomaly, the ad shows a man being interrogated by a car salesman, before cutting to a scene of the same man relaxing in his yard as a vehicle is delivered.

Vroom's spot will run on game day, with exact timing dependent on pauses in play. The used car company is the first advertiser to air its full commercial in the lead-up to this year's game.

• Scotts Miracle-Gro makes first Super Bowl appearance amid gardening boom

Scotts Miracle-Gro will run a Super Bowl ad for the first time, looking to seize on growing consumer interest in gardening during the pandemic, Ad Age reported. The brand developed a 30-second spot with agency VaynerMedia that will run in the second quarter. The spot features celebrity appearances, a call to action for consumers and an optimistic tone, and will jumpstart a larger spring marketing campaign.

References:

https://www.marketingdive.com/news/tracking-every-ad-buy-for-super-bowl-lv/591491/

What's Old is New Again - SMS Marketing

Marketing teams are always looking for the next effective channel for reaching their audience. But instead of looking for the next shiny object, looking at a technology that has been around for decades might be where to start. 

Text-based SMS messaging has a consistent 95% or more open rate compared to an average open rate of 25% for email. The market for SMS based marketing is also not yet saturated yet. The high open rate also means if you don't have a relevant message for your audience, you will have high unsubscribe rates.

The challenge with SMS is that it is mainly text based, so your copy must be on-point. An SMS campaign must be very thoughtful around the copy, and every word has to matter. A common practice is to keep SMS messages short and to the point. Distilling your message as if it was a tweet is key. 

SMS marketing is mobile marketing, so the timing of your campaign is important. Sending someone a text at 2:00 AM will not be welcome. 

Make sure you have an opt-in before messaging as the compliance considerations are stricter than say cold email outbound campaigns. 

Lastly, there are many more tools to leverage to launch an SMS campaign at scale, and tech infrastructure continues to be built, such as companies like Twilio. 

References:

https://martechseries.com/sales-marketing/b2b-commerce/customer-service/necessary-paradigm-shift-conversation-apis-will-deliver-true-two-way-omnichannel-messaging/

American Express Offers – The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

    For those not familiar with American Express offers, it is a program run by AmEx where credit card members can sign up for discount offers (i.e. $5 off $50 spend) for specific retailers. Once opted in, the offers are valid for a limited time period and provide a statement credit (with a confirmation email once used). While this program can be useful (and I have used it many times), the operations and implementation seem to be stuck in the stone age which limits its value.

The good – AmEx credit card customers can achieve significant savings on products in addition to coupons or sales. AmEx pays nothing for these discounts while building customer loyalty and satisfaction. Participating companies can offer hyper-targeted promotions to AmEx’s customers rather than broad sales.

The bad – AmEx does offer some ability to look at offers on its app, but most offer reminders and marketing is done through a clunky email format. Due to this, it’s often not easy to remember which offers you have and when they expire.

The ugly – It’s 2020 and AmEx has not utilized many of the digital marketing tools and building blocks to enhance this offering. At a quick glance these could include:

• Analysis of offer take behavior to suggest customized offers (current list in not personalized)
• Utilize app push notifications (if offer is expiring, relevant offer released)
• Explore geo-fencing (at company cost) to pair with reminders to use your credit (if near or at a store that has an offer)

With some small moves, AmEx could unlock significantly more value from this program and stop letting in languish as an overlooked benefit.

Best practices for marketing on TikTok

 TikTok has emerged as one of the most popular social media platforms among teenagers, becoming the one of most downloaded app worldwide in 2018 and 2019. Currently, there are 500 million TikTok active monthly users around the world.

TikTok encourages users to upload short videos to share publicly on the platform, most of which are up to 15-seconds long. Its target audience are teenagers and young adults with age ranging between 13 to 24 years old. 

The ways that brands can market through TikTok is similar to most other social media platforms. Brands can either create their own channel and upload their own videos. They can also collaborate with influencers to spread content to their network and audience. Lastly, brands can also pay to advertise on TikTok through its platform. 

There are a few ways to increase brand awareness and generate engagement:

1. Hashtag challenges: challenges are an essential feature of the TikTok community and users take on these challenges to make video content, making a hashtag challenge go viral. Brands can therefore make up their own hashtag and encourage TikTok users to take them on. 

2. User-generated content: brands can strive to create unique and immersive experiences. Gen-Z love to share interesting sights and experiences online, and brands that can create experiences that are "TikTok worthy" can generate a lot of UGC that allows it to be discovered by more people.

3. TikTok ads: TikTok ads include in-feed native videos, hashtag challenges, Snapchat-style 2D lens filters for photos and videos, as well as brand takeovers. 

4. Influencer marketing: given the young demographic of TikTok users, they are less interested in flashy cameraworks and high production values. They tend to trust influencers they can relate to who are original and fun. Influencer marketing is therefore an integral to any brand's TikTok strategy.

Whatsapp and its potential to change how we shop

 

Whatsapp and its potential for to change how we shop

Whatsapp has more than two billion active users. However, so far Facebook hasn’t really monetized Whatsapp. The app is primarily a personal communication tool and Facebook doesn’t make money from the private chats. This makes Whatsapp very different from the Wechat app. Wechat was initially launched as a messaging tool similar to Whatsapp. The Wechat app added other functions: a wall to share pictures and article links, mini version of third-party apps for easy access, and payment options to send between friends. Wechat has developed different ways to monetize.

Whatsapp is yet to explore monetization strategies. With its large user base, Whatsapp has great potential to add more functions, including e-commerce. Whatsapp is used outside of the US as a messaging app for small e-commerce sites to communicate with their customers and take orders. Whatsapp already launched payment functions in India and could easily scale the payment function to other regions. It could integrate the current chat function and Venmo.

The app could also add more e-commerce functionalities. The app has a shopping catalog feature which allows business to utilize the platform to reach such a large active daily user base. It is also easy for users to share product links with their friends and family on Whatsapp.

 

References:   

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/01/technology/why-whatsapp-matters.html

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-facebook-whatsapp-shopping/whatsapp-adds-shopping-catalog-feature-courting-e-commerce-idUSKBN1XI050

 

What can B2B tech marketers do when the world is working from home?

This year, there has been a significant rise in the number of people working from home. And this influences how B2B tech marketers should think about marketing.

B2B tech marketers should create campaigns that speak to the people behind the business, because B2B purchases are 50% more likely to buy a product when they see a personal value related to it. Hence, although it might not seem obvious, getting emotional can be successful.

Besides that, story telling is something that can also help.  Creative storytelling that touches issues that people can relate have an effect on the viewer and position the company as a solution to the problems presented.

Source: https://marketingtechnews.net/news/2020/dec/01/wtf-do-b2b-tech-marketers-do-when-the-world-is-wfh/

Black Friday becomes Cyber Monday becomes Cyber Week

     Black Friday wasn't too successful for a significant amount of retailers, which isn't shocking considering the state of the pandemic, and the escalating cases across the country. However, retailers that have hopped onto the e-commerce train weren't too upset as cyber Monday was the most successful of all time. Even more so, cyber Monday has extended into a whole cyber week. With a significant amount of the US population currently spending the majority of their time on the internet, retailers have done their best to maximize their attention by enticing customers with door-busting sales all week. Retailers have managed to take a day of shopping and have turned it into an entire week. Another interesting thing to note is that thanksgiving spending also increased by 22%. Customers stuck at home in more low key thanksgiving weren't as distracted and chose to instead shop on thanksgiving as a way to pass the time. 

    Most customers loved their new way of black Friday shopping, from the comfort and warmth of their couch. The situation in malls across America was much bleaker. Genuinely looking like cense out of a retail apocalypse, the malls were frightfully empty. This is no surprise considering indoor areas do not feel the safest right now. However, this new comfortable way of shopping will probably be the new norm. Even after the pandemic ends, customers have become very much accustomed to the ease and convenience of online shopping and retailers are being more than accommodating. A prime example is Nordstroms excellent omnichannel strategy of encouraging buy online pick up in-store, encouraging customers to stay out of stores but also not having to ship items by giving customers a 15 dollar credit for buying online and picking up in-store. 

The Burger King Marketing Strategy

 

The Burger King Marketing Strategy

 

Burger King and McDonald's hold fond memory of special “treats” as a child for me. Though as I grew up they have fallen more into the drunken food category, I still appreciate what they offer to the table. Whereas both brands are global and known for their burgers, it’s interesting to see how one marketing strategy trumps the other, in this case, Burger King.  

Burger King launched a social media campaign for its Whopper, showing how it became moldy over time. While the initial image of a moldy burger isn’t appealing, the shock factor emphasized how Burger King doesn’t use preservatives.

It also did a clever Whopper Detour campaign in December 2018 to promote the “order ahead” feature on its app. Customers within 600 feet of a McDonald’s restaurant were given a limited offer to purchase a Whopper for a penny. The app was downloaded over a million times after the campaign launch.

While Burger King is famous for trolling on its rivals, it also had campaigns that touch the heart and raise awareness. In early 2018, it launched Burger Queen in China on March 8^th as part of International’s Women’s Day. They asked participants to rate how they feel about themselves and invited them to Burger King where they were presented the Burger Queen, which had boxes with a mirror underneath the lid. This kind of campaign not only promotes their products but also highlights raising awareness for women to feel valued and happy.

Overall, while I still go to McDonald’s from time to time for my fix of chicken nuggets, Burger King’s clever social media, and campaigns indicate that it is a king in marketing as well.

Outsourcing x insourcing digital marketing

    Whenever a company faces a task that is away from their core purpose they should ask themselves whether is worthy to invest and develop those capabilities in-house or just outsource the production. Digital marketing is a great example of that, because several retailers are now investing in ads in social media but do not have enough scale to maintain a full time employee focused on that. On the other hand, hiring an agency to take care of all your posts can be quite expensive. So, what are the factors one should consider when facing this kind of issue?

    Below, there are some of the pros of each type of service:

• Insourcing pros
• More brand focused 
• Easier to align objectives with sales and inventory teams 
• Flexible marketing plan, can easily adjust priorities as they shift   
• Cheaper for medium to long term tasks 
• Outsourcing pros
• Pay for delivered content, not employees
• Does not consume time hiring or training employees
• Agencies can leverage work from previous contracts and deliver a better quality work in a shorter period of time
• Can be cheaper if focused in a one off project

    As we can see, both models have their advantages, thus executives need to evaluate the amount/frequency of work, marketing budget and purpose of the campaign before taking such a decision. Probably the best answer for that is to have a hybrid model, where the company insource routine activities and outsource very specific and one-off projects.

Source: https://www.cose.org/en/Mind-Your-Business/Business-Growth/Insourcing-vs-Outsourcing-Digital-Marketing 

Global Advertisement market will take at least 2 years to recover

According to a study by WARC, the global advertisement market should fall at around 10.2% this year and WARC warns that it might take at least 2 years for the market to return to pre-pandemic levels. James McDonald, head of Data Content at WARC adds that 2020 was the most hostile year ever for the advertisement market and that an immediate return to previous values is not likely since unemployment will contribute to reduce consumption and thus delay the recovery of the advertisement market. WARC also expects the market to improve 6.7% in 2021 but that would mean it will still only recivef 59% of the losses from this year. As a result, it is necessary to improve again 4.4% in 2022 to reach the same value of 2019. Interestingly, the digital marketing market remained relatively constant.

Salesforce will buy Slack for almost $28bn

Salesforce will buy Slack for almost $28bn

During the pandemic a surge of tools to work remotely was created. Slack had their IPO not so long ago at a valuation of $23bn.

This is not new for Salesforce, acquiring companies. In the past 5 years they acquired 27 companies, under their CEO , Marc Benioff, they acquired 60.

 Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/01/technology/salesforce-slack-deal.html

Why Black Friday and Cyber Monday Advertisings are coming earlier

 Many businesses are offering discounts earlier than the typical four-day sales period between Black Friday and Cyber Monday. Some businesses are even using the weeks between the election and Black Friday to test out different promotion strategies so they can be fully ready for the shopping weekend.

The sense of urgency is partially driven by the shift of customer behavior from going in store in person to e-commerce. Coupled with the rising COVID-19 cases, most US customers will be shopping in front of their computer screens, rather than going to the retail stores in person. This makes digital marketing even more imperative.

According to Katya Constantine, the CEO of performance marketing agency Digishop Girl, there has been an increase in CPMs and a decrease in conversation rates following the election. This shows that since the election, more customers are interested in searching for deals in preparation for the shopping weekend, but few have committed. This is a great opportunity for businesses to gather customer behavior intel by trying out different offers.

According to Jeremy Sonne, managing director of Moonshine Marketing, he has seen improved performance in businesses that started running promotions earlier this year. Many businesses created three or four different offers to test out, before deciding on which one to go with.

 

Source:

https://digiday.com/marketing/time-to-test-multiple-offers-why-black-friday-and-cyber-monday-advertising-is-coming-earlier-than-ever-this-year/

Google Maps takes on Facebook (Again)

How many of you remember Google+, the social network that rolled out in 2011 and shut down in 2019. But it had obviously failed long before the official shutdown in 2019. Despite the wide-scale usage of google account for email, YouTube and Drive, they were unable to take on the social media giant Facebook in gaining active daily users. This time Google is focusing on just one aspect of social media, the newsfeed, and is bringing it to Google Maps. The "Community Feed" as google calls it will be initially focused on food and drinks. This scrollable feed will include content created by users and businesses that pertain to locations near you. The user will be able to like posts, follow creators and business, and even message businesses directly.

I believe Google's community feed will end up being more like yelp, where people will only engage with it if they are looking for something specific. I believe they will have a hard time providing the entertainment factor of a true social media platform and will end up being more paid advertising for businesses. I am skeptical that this new attempt at taking on Facebook will pan out much better than the previous one.

https://techcrunch.com/2020/12/01/google-maps-takes-on-facebook-with-its-own-news-feed/

Netlix’s Digital Marketing Strategy As Told By Social Media Engagement

 It is well known that Netflix’s twitter responses are often a part of their Instagram strategy. A sassy response, pop culture relevant memes, a hilarious misnomer and politically motivated clap backs are hallmarks of the content giant’s digital marketing strategy – a tactic that has positioned the company well among millennials and the Gen-Z population even when its content has missed the mark. Where other social media accounts shy away from multiple replies, retweets and controversial messaging, Netflix uses this as an opportunity to build community leverage. While these digital marketing strategies are important for customer engagement, they are also an important differentiating factor as streaming wars ensue and media platform competition grows.

 

Vulture Magazine writes brilliantly about one of Netflix’s most recent (and widely successful) campaigns. In September 2020, Netflix kicked off its first-ever global brand campaign, a 27-country promotional effort built around the tagline “One Story Away.” “Netflix will be attaching that phrase to digital, TV, and billboard advertisements around the world, starting with a 90-second video spot that combines clips from more than two dozen of its original titles and narration by different members of the company’s creative family (including director Ava DuVernay in the United States). All of the ads will feature Netflix’s familiar red progress bar, an artistic tool meant to underscore how the progression of a storyline can change how viewers see things.”

This campaign and Netflix’s social media strategy may not seem to have much in common but there is an important digital strategy at play. Netflix has been moving away from a content platform to being a content creator. These strategies of polling users, engaging with them and aggregating existing content allows Netflix to gain further insight into customer preferences (both through A/B testing but also through the volume of responses and the high engagement they receive), which prove vital in the expansion of their content offerings.

New Google TV Integrates With 30+ Streaming Services

Google has come out with a new platform called Google TV (formerly "Play Movies") and in addition to being able to use content from its own services like YouTube TV, Google TV can also aggregate and organize content from a number of other sources, including major third party streamers like Hulu and Disney+. 

Below is the full list of streaming services that are supported on the platform:

• ABC
• Amazon Prime Video
• AMC
• A&E
• CBS All Access
• Crackle
• Comedy Central
• DC Universe
• Disney NOW
• Disney+
• Epix Now
• Fox Now
• Google Play Movies (now Google TV)
• Hulu
• HBO Go
• HBO Max
• History
• Lifetime
• MTV
• NBC
• Pluto TV
• Showtime
• Showtime Anytime
• Sling TV
• Starz
• TBS
• The CW
• TNT
• Tubi TV
• VH1
• YouTube TV

This new Google TV platform replaces "Play Movies," which wasn't widely used, and makes things more streamlined by directly placing your account-wide Google watchlist on your TV. It is available on the new Chromecast and will be launched on Android phones as well.

PepsiCo's in-house technology informs radical shift to digital

PepsiCo has accelerated growth from traditional TV to streaming while expanding its online sales. 

At the center of their efforts is their ROI engine that has supposedly increased their return on investment during campaigns. 

ROI Engine's genesis predates the pandemic, with the idea around the technology first emerging a year and a half ago amid a broader reassessment of PepsiCo's marketing measurement.

The fact that ROI engine was deployed beforehand helped PepsiCo accelerating and enjoy growth in digital sales in the pandemic particularly in North America. Now it's time to deploy it in the rest of the world.  

Facebook seeks to help businesses advertise and sell with Kustomer acquisition

 Source: https://www.cnbc.com/2020/11/30/facebook-acquires-kustomer-a-crm-start-up.html

On Monday 11/30, Facebook announced that it had acquired Kustomer, a CRM startup that leverages AI and process automation to provide an efficient platform for companies to manage sales and customer relationships.  While most of Facebooks acquisitions have been consumer-facing (Instagram, WhatsApp, Giphy, etc.), this acquisition signals Facebook's intent to provide even more services for companies who are using the platform to advertise and sell their products.  With a Kustomer integration, companies could feasibly advertise and close sales on platforms like WhatsApp and Messenger, branching beyond display advertising and Facebook's Marketplace platform, ultimately driving more conversions.  This will likely be a big revenue driver for Facebook as well, which earns 99% of its revenue from advertising.

It's unclear when we might expect changes to Facebook's core platforms; they'll want to make sure an integration with such revenue implications is done right.  However, with the resources Facebook has at its disposal, I'd be surprised if we don't start to see these options popping up for advertisers very soon.

Lonely Planet sold to US Digital Marketing Group - Red Ventures

 

Travel guide publisher Lonely Planet has been acquired by US digital marketing group Red Ventures for an undisclosed sum.

Red Ventures aims to propel Lonely Planet it into the digital era while “remaining committed to publishing the guidebooks that have made Lonely Planet the iconic brand it is today”.

Red Ventures said Lonely Planet had produced over 150 million travel guidebooks, reaches 186 million people annually and covers 22,000 destinations around the world.

As the pandemic hit in March and April, Lonely Planet announced office closures and redundancies across the group, including several at its Dublin office. While the company said it would continue publishing its country guidebooks, it cut back several ancillary services.

https://www.irishtimes.com/business/media-and-marketing/lonely-planet-sold-to-us-digital-marketing-group-for-undisclosed-sum-1.4424895

Miguel Fernandes

Amazon's Biggest Holiday Shopping Year Despite the Pandemic

Today, Amazon reported that it experienced its biggest holiday shopping season in 2020. Independent businesses selling on Amazon surpassed $4.8 billion in worldwide sales from Black Friday through Cyber Monday, which is up 60% from last year. 71,000 small and medium-sized businesses had seen sales above $100,000.

At the same time, foot traffic to stores on Black Friday dropped 52% compared with last year. Amazon is one of the best positioned retailers to continue benefiting from this trend. As more users will continue fearing going out and instead will order online, the market which Amazon dominates, Amazon will continue reaping benefits until the arrival of stronger e-commerce competitors.

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/12/01/amazon-announces-black-friday-cyber-monday-2020-results.html