Facebook says that businesses are failing to see the wider benefits of social commerce platforms, explaining it’s not just about sales figures.
Speaking to New Media Age, Gavin Sathianathan, Facebook’s strategic partner manager, admitted that steps need to be taken to firstly define what social commerce really is.
“It’s really important we nail what we mean by ‘social commerce’,” he said. “At Facebook, we do not equate ‘social commerce’ with opening a store within the network.”
Sathianathan’s comments come as several of the UK’s biggest retailers, John Lewis and Reiss, announced that they are to shy away from Facebook marketing in favour of mobile – or m-commerce – in 2012.
Sathianathan says that it’s narrow-minded for firms to associate Facebook commerce – or ‘f-commerce’ – purely with the act of selling goods.
He argues that the real definition needs to incorporate positive images about the brand as part of a longer-term sales strategy. This is facilitated by the use of ‘likes’ and ‘shares’, which apparently make up the bulk of retailer’s conversations with the firm.
“When I talk to retailers about this, I try to make it clear that it’s about how we can bring social media to bear on the purchase process, be that in a Facebook store or not,” he explained.
Demonstrating its power, the marketing manager for Lynx, Selina Sykes, recently explained how her brand uses f-commerce. She revealed that the brand used to the tool to get people talking about its latest ladies’ fragrance, ahead of its release.
“With nearly 700,000 fans, using f-commerce was a logical part of the launch phase for us to make this limited edition For Her fragrance exclusively available to our existing and new fans, ahead of the cans going on sale in stores,” she said, according to The Drum.
The firm also successfully sold 100 cans of the limited edition product on Facebook, priced at £3.25 each, as part of the campaign.
Related posts:
