Social Media Users’ Demands for Seamless Social Commerce Increases
The marketing funnel was pretty predictable and reliable for decades. But now consumers, and even B2B buyers, are behaving differently and the addition of many new channels and touchpoints is changing the funnel. Consumers have an evolving set of ways to get exposed to brands, and their awareness is affected on screens and in environments that work very differently from traditional media and even early digital media.
Social media has arguably had the biggest impact on the ways in which consumers discover, declare their intent and act on messaging, offers and stimulus, thus warping the marketing funnel in ways that marketers hadn’t accounted for.
Consumers expect a seamless buying and brand experience
What we see today in social networks, especially the ones most heavily accessed by consumers through mobile devices and smartphones is that their commercial actions — research leading to a click-to-buy, signups, simple transactions and customer service, among others — are creating expectations for a more seamless, frictionless buying and brand experience.
Reduce risk of customer abandonment
Many users don’t want to leave a social environment for an external site to complete a search or purchase. And brands need to recognize the positive returns on investment for eliminating confusion and reducing the risk of customer abandonment. The brands that are using social environments for efficiency and increased profit are capturing purchase intent when consumer enthusiasm for their product is at its highest, and that means a clean throughput from exposure to transaction.
Product searches are up on Amazon and down on Google
In mobile apps and online, consumers are in the mood to purchase. One indication that has ramifications for advertisers in social networks is that according to The Competitive State of eCommerce Marketplaces Data Report, from Jumpshot, Inc., from 2015 to 2018, Amazon surpassed Google for product searches, growing from 46% to 54% and Google declining from 54% to 46%. What this shows is that when people want to shop, they go directly to the source and want to follow all the way through to the shopping cart. Recognizing a message on a social app from brand advertising, merchandising, or product aggregators and then having to switch to a buying experience in a separate application or site is far less favorable and leads to major drop-off in consumer action and data.
The answer is a noticeable, compelling social media ad that seamlessly ties discovery of the brand, product discovery, cross-selling, share-ability and swift transaction. The result can outperform higher spenders and even more established brands that fail to provide a full trip down the funnel.
Author: Eric Bader, Global Digital Consulting Partner, Ogilvy Consulting
At Ogilvy Consulting, Eric works with clients to design and implement strategies for building business value through data intelligence, content development, program optimization and marketing performance.
