Not surprisingly, Facebook is the social media site of choice for many US online retailers, judging by an August 2008 study by Internet Retailer and Vovici.
What is surprising, is the low number of retailers who are using social networking sites to reach consumers. And these are online retailers, people who know and understand about the Internet, or at least should.
Less than a third of US online retailers surveyed said they had a Facebook page. The presence is even worse on the other major social networks with only 27% of retailers having a presence on MySpace, and only 26% having a presence on YouTube.
emarkete reported on a September 2008 study by Rosetta (formerly Brulant) that focused on the top 100 online retailers in the US painted a slightly different picture. The Rosetta study found that 59 (59%) of those surveyed had a fan page on Facebook, up from 30 in May 2008. Among the 29 who added Facebook pages since the previous study were Best Buy, Toys “R” Us, Kohl’s and Wal-Mart.
“Social media sites continue to be an important source of community connection, and savvy retailers are reaping the benefits of Facebook’s rapid extension into new demographics, such as Gen X and seniors,” said Adam Cohen, partner with Rosetta’s consumer goods and retail practice, in an interview with eMarketer.
However, Mr. Cohen said that retailers should guard against casual attitudes toward their Facebook presences.
“It’s important that retailers don’t just slap up a page because everyone is talking about Facebook. An effective presence requires that you carefully consider what your customers are looking for, what you would like to communicate, and what role a fan page should play in your overall online strategy.”
This is a good point by Adam. Simply having a page on Facebook without any idea of how it will help your business or how you will measure success is doomed to fail. The most effective social media marketing campaigns asnwer these questions first before they create a presence on a social networking site.
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
This is good information. While I understand the importance it’s nice to have an easy-to-read nugget to send to my clients when suggesting next moves for their marketing.
Thanks.
Thanks for including our study and mention of the article. I am glad to hear you agree – too often companies jump to throw a fan page out there in Facebook because it’s a popular technology platform right now, rather than decide a strategy to implement. They often can end up disappointed when no fans show up.
{ 10 trackbacks }