E-commerce study: automatic recommendations disappointing for most customers

When we go shopping online today, we all get recommendations for additional or interesting products that might be relevant for us. Might be?! Well, a new research by ChoiceStream called 2009 Personalization Survey states that recommendations by e-tailers are still poor. A personalization strategy can be benefitial for businesses but also be an access killer for customers of online shops.

Almost 60% of the internet users were not happy with personal product recommendations on e-commerce sites in 2009. Compared to 2008 (14% less than this year) this negative shopping experience is massively increasing. The reason is obvious. On the one hand, data mining technology is affordable and used by more and more shops (http://www.thestrategyweb.com/wp-admin/post.php?action=edit&post=9245&message=10although general knowledge on integration is probably low). And on the other hand, customer personalization expectation is increasing – 74% of the respondents notice product recommendations.

“Shoppers notice recommendations more than they have in the past and, in fact, have come to expect them” (…) “For this reason, quality and relevance are under a microscope.” Lori Trahan, vice president of marketing, ChoiceStream.

iTunes, Netflix and Amazon know their personalization business best and seem to have the lead in personalization efforts. The entertainment business (music and big book-stores) comes quite close with their recommendations, but shoe, toy and office supply sites seem to show bad results.

Spot On!
When results go up by almost 15% to the prior year, of shoppers who complain about not getting recommendations, then this should ring e-tailers’ alarm bells. Especially, if we learn from the study that nearly 60% who had spent at least $500 online in the past six months buy something according to recommendation features. Less successful are suggestions on order confirmations, promotional and transactional e-mails.

PS: Testing is important and e-tailers should be doing this in a periodical mode.

Can corporate social media engagement replace customer loyalty cards?

We all have our purse full of plastic cards for customer loyaly programs. These won’t make us rich. They make us save money, or get kickbacks from companies and brands if we want. And the philosophy of these programs is clever. Companies have the feeling of being in touch with their clients on a regular basis, making sure customers stay informed about their product offerings.

The customers bottleneck is, well yes, we have to carry multiple plastic cards in a credit card format with us. So, why not leaving these cards behind after 20 years and just make customers fans on Facebook and/or followers on Twitter of brands?

Imagine you go into a store and you’ll see a “Follow us on Facebook or Twitter or on our iPhone app” sign taped to the cash mashine instead of receiving print and plastic to carry home?! – Why not save the trees and oil resources!?

Companies install reward program cards to make us buy more of their products, or more frequently. And companies get more feedback on our buying habits. So, for companies these cards are an essential part of their customer loyalty strategy.

And customers with a big purse are happy. Others don’t want to have all these cards. Thus, these customers are not lsitening to what’s the latest promotion. Now, who of the male world is happy with all these plastic cards making our trouser pockets look like fat kangaroo pouches?

In most cases, these loyalty cards are addressing and being used by an old-economy’s vanity (IMHO), or women. “Look how much companies are interested in having me as their customer”, I heard a woman say the other day.

A recent study by the CMO Council “The Leaders in Loyalty: Feeling the Love from the Loyalty Club” shows the trouble of loyalty programs. 54% of consumers mention that irrelevant messages, low value rewards, and impersonal engagements may decrease their loyalty for brands and their services, and with that their loyalty programs.

And yes, we can understand this fact when our online and offline mailboxes are full of non-personalized, unexhiting and unintersting promotions from company’s so called loyalty programs. Talking of me, these loyalty programs get one chance and I cut those cards into pieces straight away when the company loyalty program fails.

Now, what does this means for loyalty programs when we match these results with the latest survey by MarketingSherpa. The new web generation and prosumers love following brands as they expect savings, learning about specials and sales as the top motivation to friend and/or follow a brand online. If companies are aware of this fact and learn from it, why not replacing the old loyalty card concept then?

The benefit of the fan and follower systemtic is quite obvious…
- You become a fan and/or follower when a brand becomes of interest for YOU as a customer
- You become a fan and/or follower of your favorite brand when YOU are in a purchase process
- You can check status updates on sales, discounts and promotions when YOU need them (not when the company wants to sell more products)

OK, thinking of business intelligence and data mining sales cycle topics, it might become difficult for companies to track purchase processes as good as now. But, isn’t the customer king with the rise of social media? And companies could save money for print mailings and their plastic card production, right?

Spot On!
Some weeks ago, I have thought about Twitter as a sales tool and with this post, I am trying to take this idea a bit further. It shall illustrate how much a company’s sales and customer service strategy gets influenced by a new social web strategy where the customer holds the power of interest in promotions.

So, let us know what you think about the idea that Facebook fan pages, Twitter company accounts or corporate LinkedIn groups could replace loyalty programs in the future? A dream, a vision or a stupid idea?

Is e-meeting a trend or the future?

While some signs suggest the economy is stabilizing and the global recession might find an ending, the majority of business travel managers will be looking for alternatives to travel that can be enabled by technology in the future.

A recent survey “2010 Corporate-Travel Spend Plans & Tactics,” conducted by Kotler Marketing Group, in conjunction with the Association of Corporate Travel Executives (ACTE) provides a detailed analysis of enterprise travel spend plans versus the growing use of electronic alternatives (e.g. web- and video-conferencing) to offset travel.

- 55% of respondents would rely on electronic alternatives more in the future in order to reduce travel expenses.
- More than 40% said their organizations are replacing sales-related travel with conferencing in coming years.
- However, web and video conferencing were not rated as “usually effective” means in accomplishing the goals of their meetings.

Another interesting result of a study by the Palm Springs Desert Resort Communities Convention and Visitors Authority shows that desert hotels lost an estimated $30 million in convention and meetings travel from late 2008 through May.

Now, we might argue and ask the question if executives refrain from going on planes the way they did in the past. And we might ask if spending money for big conferences is ‘out’. So, will department kick-offs with nice trips to the US (or some other interesting places worldwide) be a thing of the past in some years?

Spot On!
Some years ago, one of my partners said: “Can I insert my Miles&More card in our new video conferencing system?” What sounds funny to us has more impact than most of top management members might think. Traveling is a personality statement for a lot of managers. It is also about gestures, mimic, sensual perception, hand-shaking and all that which makes more impression on our business contacts and our deals than some stockholders might think when looking at their shareholder value. Meaning, companies will face a conflict in terms of cost savings and probably embrace the trend of the new technology. Nevertheless, businesses will be trying out alternatives to traveling for meetings with web- or video conferencing. In my opinion meetings need to happen in real life more frequently than online.

Do meetings not have a deeper meaning for business? What is your perception about the effectiveness of these new meeting technologies as travel replacements?

Studie: Marketingprofis stehen auf Social Media

Der Marketing Service Provider Alterian hat heute seine zum siebten Mal durchgeführte jährliche Marketing-Studie veröffentlicht, die unter dem Titel ‘Are you ready to engage?’ erschienen ist.

Die Studie wurde unter 1068 Marketingprofis weltweit durchgeführt, wobei man sagen muß, daß 98% der Teilnehmer aus Europa und Amerika kamen. Lediglich 2% nahmen aus dem asiatisch-pazifischen Raum oder sonstigen Ländern teil.

Die Hauptaussage der Studie zeigt, daß 66% der Teilnehmer in Social Media Marketing (SMM) in 2010 investieren werden. Ganze 40% davon sagen, daß sie ihre Budgets hierfür aus dem traditionellen Direkt-Marketing Budget in Richtung Social Media Marketing schieben werden. Ein Anzeichen dafür, daß die Awareness für die Engagement Economy in den Unternehmen Einzu erhält und man offensichtlich die Bekenenntnis-Bereitschaft der in Social Media aktiven Menschen zu Marken zur Lead Generierung nutzen will.

Auch das Thema Social Media Monitoring nehmen die Unternehmen inzwischen ernst. So, wollen 36% der Befragten für Social Media Monitoring und Web-Analyse Budgets einsetzen. Dem entgegen stehen immerhin 42%, die sagen, daß sie bisher noch keine Zugriffs- oder Webanalyse Daten in ihre Kunden- und Email Datenbanken einfließen lassen.

Alterian CEO, David Eldridge, resümiert die Studie und die Aussichten auf das nächste Jahrzehnt mit folgenden Worten…

“2010 marks the start of the digital decade for marketing. Untargeted and irrelevant marketing techniques are now redundant and the results of this survey show many in the industry recognise this. The one thing to remember, however, is that investment in Social Media Marketing is futile without adequate measurement.”

Die Studie zeigt weiterhin, daß mehr als die Hälfte aller Teilnehmer einen ‘ordentlichen’ oder ’signifikanten’ Teil ihrer Anstrengungen dafür einsetzen werden, von einem kampagnen-zentrierten Direkt-Marketing Modell hin zu einem Multichannel Kundenbeziehungs-Modell übergehen. Lediglich 7% der Firmen unternehmen diesbzüglich keine Anstrengungen.

Für mich interessant ist die Selbstwahrnehmung der Marketingprofis, wie weit der interne Wissensstand zu modernen Marketing-und Kundenbindungsstrategien von dem bestehendem Marketingpersonal ist.

Es sieht also so aus, als ob die Marketingprofis doch noch einigen Wissensdurst bei Themen um das Social Web haben müßten. Wenn nur 17% die Vorteile der modernen Tools einzuschätzen wissen, scheint noch viel Lern- und Informationsbedarf in Unternehmen zu sein.

Die Studieergebnisse können hier heruntergeladen werden.

Study: Facebook is for women, Twitter less…

A recent study became of interest for me after having visited the Caveman show around Christmas. As we all know, and the comedy show makes this clear in a spectacular and funny way, men speak 2.000 and women 7.000 words on a normal day. Comparing this with the annual social media study by Shespeaks, it might sound obvious why Facebook is more for women, and Twitter the preferred social network for men.

Though having the proof with the study now, we might also argue that this is a prejudice. But let’s agree this is true for today…

The study has asked 1.559 women of the Shespeaks community which social network they are using. And, thinking about the above words, the result is not surprising. Facebook is the preferred platform for women: 95% of the surveyed women say that they have a Facebook profile. But only 38% are micro-blogging on Twitter. But why?

On Facebook women find what they want and need while not underlying any technical length restriction in communication (Sorry, Twitter is a 140 characters only platform…). Thus, social networking -at least for the moment- gives the proof for a long mystery. But there is more in the study from a business perspective!

Social media is becoming more and more a “strong driver for purchase decisions”. As the Shespeaks study states, with social networking women can satisfy their shopping behavior in a much better way. From a woman’s perspective, especially Facebook offers the right platform for brand commitment… and even more for recommendations. 80% have become fans of products and brands and 72% of the women said that they learn about a new product on Facebook. A dream-land for every marketer, right?!

Nevertheless, Twitter is the still very powerful for pr and marketing efforts – also if marketers want to reach women. Receiving coupon-codes is as popular on Twitter as it used to be (and still is) in the offline world. And when we look at the fact that 30% have purchased directly via Twitter or used a coupon-code therefore (27%), we might also argue that Twitter is a useful sales tool.

Study: Social Network access at work? Teens expect it!

Your company thinks about limiting or restricting the access of social networks during working time? You better have a second thought about it…

A recent study states that for the net generation social networking has become a crucial part of their business life. It is so central to their lifestyle that it becomes one of the main decision criteria when weighing job offers.

The Junior Achievement/Deloitte Teen Ethics Survey shows that 88% of teenagers use social networks on a daily basis. 58% of the teenagers surveyed said that they would consider the ability to access social networks when considering a job offer.

Business decision makers in companies should be aware of the fact that this might become a central question in recruiting talks. Teenagers will definitely make decision pro or contra a job on considerations about having the ability to access Facebook, Twitter, and the lot when applying for jobs.

Spot On!
Teenagers don’t use social networks to waste time witht heir peers, or even be unproductive. The main reasons for the use becomes clear when taking a close look at the results. 51% of the surveyed teens use social networks to help others. And 29% use the social benefit to create awareness for a cause. So, if you think of improving customer service, you should consider these facts and try to transfer the social abilities of the networks in order to build a stable customer communication world – with the net generation.

2010: Social media budgets increase – but where to find resources?

The good news? Budgets for social media will increase. The bad news? Companies are struggling to find the time and resources to handle their activity, according to the “Social Media and Online PR Report” by Econsultancy and bigmouthmedia.

The research aimed at finding out how companies are using online PR tactics and social media sites (i.e. Facebook and Twitter) for marketing and customer service. The result of the survey shows that the majority of companies (86%) plan to spend more budgets on social media next year 2010 – 13% are not changing their budgets and will keep the same level of spendings.

The biggest challenge for companies is resources: 54% see this as a significant problem. And 90% say it is more time-consuming internally than last year. The named benefit is remarkable: One-fourth of companies found they have achieved “real, tangible value” from social media; 60% say they have bained “some benefit but nothing concrete.”

“The reality is that most businesses understand how to listen, what to measure and where to engage but are struggling to define the value of engagement and reputation in social spaces,” said Michelle Goodall, Econsultancy’s social media and online PR consultant.

One of this companies is definitely Dell. They just announced to have sold PCs, accessories and software for 6,5 million USD via Twitter.

Some Twitter results…
- 78% use Twitter as a social media tactic and 74% of agency respondents
- 65% social network profile creatio n and management
- 62% use the micro-blogging site for publicizing new content
- 54% use the channel for marketing
- 47% for brand monitoring

Spot On!
Only 27% take the advantage of using Twitter as a customer service (and 25% as a customer feedback) tool for reacting to issues and inquiries. And when 31% see “tremendous opportunities” available in using Twitter for customer contact, but only half reporting that their companies are “open-minded but not fully convinced about the value to the business”, it tells the story: We all need to create results and cases in order to provide the positive proof. Especially, when 7% say their organization feels that Twitter is over-hyped and a fad.

News Update – Best of the Day

Although web 2.0 provides all the benfit for e-learning, the use is till low. The study “Benchmarking Online Operations: Snapshots of an Emerging Industry” by the consulting company Eduventures shows that the education they offer is still based on “rudimentary, text-based technology”. This stands in contrast to webinars, web-conference or any kind of podcast or vidcast tools that the web 2.0 world offers today. “But when it came to technology, the Eduventures survey found that the widely used tools are e-mail, text discussions that don’t happen in real time, physical textbooks, and word and PDF documents”, reports http://chronicle.com/blogPost/Online-Programs-Profits-Are/8517/?sid=wc&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en.

Blogher released a new study on how social networks are used by men and women in the US. The main findings are…

- 84% (16 out of 19) of the sites have more female than male users.
- Twitter with 59% female users and Facebook with 57%.
- Most female-dominated sites: Bebo 66%, MySpace and Classmates.com 64%.
- Average ratio of 19 sites: 47% male, 53% female.

MINI started a great project“Wash me” at retail on the 3rd of November “when 10 different artists are each presented with a MINI to deface — ahem!…design at will”. See what these guys came up with…

Tags: Ads, Consulting, Content, Facebook, Media, MySpace, Networks, Survey, Tools, Twitter, User, Web 2.0, YouTube

News Update – Best of the Day

21.10.2009 von Martin Meyer-Gossner  
Kategorie Daily Top 3

Ein Kommentar

Do you know how many Tweets we have for now worldwide? 5 billion (in the form of a reply to another user)! Caroline McCarthy (CNET) wrote about a company called Gigatweet that has been measuring the service for some time now… and sometiomes you ask yourself: Do we really have to waste the bandwidth by sending out so many Tweets?

SMB’s are quicker adopting social media, a study by Internet2Go, an Opus Research advisory service, and MerchantCircle finds. The main findings for me are…

- 45% have a presence or profiles on Facebook and Twitter to promote their businesses
- 79% have annual marketing budgets of less than $5,000 with the 44% spending “less than $1,000” annually on advertising and marketing
- 75% said they monitor online reviews of their business

Fantastic commercials – men are so simply but ey… we are clever, aren’t we… Well done, Jim Beam!

Tags: Ads, Budget, Content, Facebook, Marke, Marketing, Media, Search, Social Media, Survey, Twitter, User, YouTube

News Update – Best of the Day

08.10.2009 von Martin Meyer-Gossner  
Kategorie Daily Top 3

Schreiben Sie einen Kommentar

Although this sounds unbelievable… New study (online poll amongst 271 US CMO’s by ME&L Worldwide and PRWeek – Marketers ignore social media feedback. The findings…
- 70% of marketers have never made change to their products and marketing campaigns based on consumer feedback on social media sites
- 39% are not convinced of social media
- 43% admit lack of knowledge

To find the benefits of Twitter is not easy. Every company has to evaluate Twitter for their own purpose (company messages, products and service). Nevertheless, this Forbes article gives 21 tips on how to use Twitter for business.

As usual – funny commercial for the day by bud.tv…

Tags: Ads, Change, CMO, Content, Marke, Marketing, Media, Social Media, Studie, Survey, Twitter, YouTube

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