This morning a post from eMarketer confirmed what many brands are already discovering on Facebook: online shoppers are on Facebook and interacting with brands. The numbers speak for themselves. The post references the “2010 Social Media Report” from ForeSee Results which reveals that 69% of online shoppers regularly use social media sites. It’s no surprises that Facebook is the most popular social media site that online shoppers use, by a landslide.
The most surprising element in the article is that Myspace is 1. present and 2. ahead of its successors which include Twitter and Yelp.
The article further shares that “more than one-half of online shoppers who use social media choose to engage with brands on the sites by friending or following them. While some social site users interacted with a large number of brands, most were fans of only a few. Social network users actively want to engage, but their time and attention is limited.” If more people are interacting with fewer brands, it means that the brands that they are interacting with have more influence and less competition for attention for the fans and followers within the social networking platforms. This is a big opportunity for brands to reach these users but it also means that brands are going to have to make it worth their customers time to interact with them on sites like Facebook.
eMarketer also shares that the main reasons why people are interacting with brands on social networking sites are to get good deals and learn about products; fewer people are interested in customer support. Repeat – they want good deals and to learn about products. This translates into sales derived from social networking sites. If the audience is king, here’s the data to support what they want. They will interact with your brand but you have to do your part to make it worth their while with relevant information and exclusive deals. It’s clear that brands can no longer ignore the fact that social media, especially Facebook, is an important tool to reach and engage with customers.
To read eMarketer’s post “Finding Online Shoppers on Facebook,” click here.
Post written by Helen Todd aka @helenstravels. To learn more from fbadz.com, become a fan!
