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Research shows that getting consumers to like a fan page has some positive effect on conversion rates. In fact, where commerce is concerned, Facebook could replace the thumbs up icon with a foot – as in “foot in the door” – because that’s what brands are getting with the like. It’s a social gesture that potentially manifests in the consistency rule kicking in (yes, pun intended).

Social commerce platform provider 8thBridge wondered just what effect the “like” had on purchase behavior, so the company conducted a survey to find out.

The above graphs are what they found.

Do you encourage “small steps, big steps ” approach in your strategy?

P&G is very focused on consumers—we say the consumer is boss. And we have a go-to-market strategy that openly declares “win wherever people shop.” That’s important to understand, because as more and more people around the world are shopping in different channels, our role is to be present wherever they are.

A couple of years ago we launched the eStore with two objectives. The first one was to learn about this new space. And the second objective was to generate insight that we could share with all our retail partners so that together we can provide the best possible experience for consumers.

We are learning that more and more people are spending time online to interact with the brands, even if they buy offline. Brand-building is becoming a digital exchange, rather than a one-way exchange.

The second thing we are learning is that content is very important to help consumers make a decision. We know that what we call “enhanced content” is very important to establishing an even stronger relationship with consumers. When you go on-shelf, most of your interaction with a brand is through what you remember you saw at home or the packaging you see in front of you.

Online, as you know, you can interact with the brand with two-way, always-on communication. You can upload videos. You can read ratings and reviews from other people and other activities.

56% of respondents were expecting to use their devices for shopping-related activities this holiday. More than a third (38%) will likely use the device to find store locations, 34% to compare prices, 28% to research deals or find coupons, and 27% to get product reviews.

How to get consumers over the hump of information-gathering to purchase? Well, their reticence may be melt… if there’s a deal in it for them!

In a survey of 1,000 U.S. consumers, 62% said they were willing to use their cell phones to make a purchase if offered an opportunity by coupon, discount offers, text alerts, gift cards or loyalty points.

The actual impetus to buy by mobile device, however, does plummet without a direct incentive or prompt, as only 22% said they would make a purchase on their devices.

Not only are poorly designed m-commerce experiences holding consumers back, but expecting consumers to pay using payment methods they always have doesn’t work.

Generally, consumers remain unsure as to which mobile payment options are available, let alone reliable and trusted. The survey asked what m-payment solution might increase their use of direct m-commerce. A quarter said that a payment solution tied to their own financial institution would encourage their greater use of mobile payments, and 22% would be encouraged by PayPal availability. Only 18% said the presence of a credit card solution would persuade them to use mobile commerce.

Brands use Facebook for two reasons: to reach the widest pool of consumers by going where their customers are congregating; and because of the potential for consumers to share information with each other, effectively marketing the brand to their friends.

So why do consumers use brands on Facebook? Ultimately, they’ll buy from retailers they know and trust. A social media campaign may not yet mean that consumers buy from the brand on Facebook, but if [UK retailer] ASOS is anything to go by, it will influence sales through the brand’s site.

And, after all, isn’t that a better result for the retailer [or manufacturer] who’ll have more control over the buying process?

But f-commerce shouldn’t be simply a replica of an e-commerce experience. Nor should it cannibalise sales from the brand’s website. Facebook can be a great place to trial exclusive or new products, as long as the brand is prepared to listen to feedback and act on it.

I agree with this analysis. As we talked about earlier this week, putting all your eggs in the Facebook basket is dangerous. But Facebook can be an extremely viable piece of your strategy.

U.S. based direct-to-consumer platform Alice recently expanded to Europe (that’s our company), and now Nestle is starting their own direct-to-consumer effort in Germany:

So Nestlé has joined the social commerce movement, launching an innovative new social marketplace (Nestlé Marktplatz), allowing consumers to discover, shop and share 72 Nestlé brands. Piloting in Germany, this direct-to-consumer marketplace showcases Nestlé’s extended brand range.

Significantly, Nestlé is looking to engage Marketplace customers as brand advisors – inviting ideas and suggestions for new products, packaging and usage occasions.  In other words, the marketplace is not only a forum for buying and selling, it’s also a forum for conversations between customers – who can rate, comment, seek advice and share ideas with each other – and a forum for conversations with customers.

Overall, we like the concept of the Nestlé Marktplatz, particularly as an insight and advocacy generator, and as a central e-commerce platform that will be able to power individual Facebook fan-stores for individual brands.  We see the value for Nestlé, but the challenge for Nestlé will be to demonstrate a compelling reason-to-shop on this central marketplace – as opposed to from a brand-specific Facebook fan-store, or from supermarkets offering a far broader range of products. Why shop 72 brands when you can shop 7200 brands on online supermarkets?

The draw certainly won’t come from the Marketplace’s social features – these are increasingly standard hygiene factors on all decent e-commerce platforms.  Instead, we think Nestlé should turn up the volume on the Marketplace’s differentiator – exclusive access to new and non-local products, whilst adding in an enhanced dose of brand utility in the form of exclusive and quality recipe/nutrition guides/apps and a Kraft iFood-style shopping list manager. We’d also integrate the Marketplace with Facebook, if only to do away with the daunting friction-laden sign up form.

The study by e-commerce agency Screen Pages looked at more than 1.5m visitors to 30 non-optimised websites, and found that conversion rates were an average of 41% lower on mobile.

Whether retailers are prepared or not, mobile users are accessing their sites, and this study gives some idea of how mobile users interact with standard sites on mobiles.

A few highlights from the study

• 10% of visits are from mobile devices, although for premium brands targeting a more affluent demographic, there is evidence that this figure can approach 15%.
• 81% of all mobile visits are from Apple devices (47% are iPad & 35% are from the iPhone). Again, this may be a function of demographics, but clearly shows the popularity of Apple products.
• Average bounce rates are lower by 5% (40% vs 35%). Bounce rates are a measure of engagement and show the % of visitors who arrive on a page and leave. Driven by smaller screens and possibly the more demanding mobile user, websites must work harder to engage.
• In terms of sales, e-commerce conversion ratios were 41% lower overall, ranging from 13% to 73% lower. However, one luxury brand showed an increase of 30%.
• Average order values (AOV) were slightly higher on average, with half the sample showing an increase (10 of the sites showing an increase in AOV of 10% or more). Those showing a decrease posted in the range 10-30% less.

While online grocery shopping accounts for just 2% of total domestic consumer packaged goods sales, it is expected to more than double in the next few years.  A study from the Nielsen Company and MyWebGrocer predicts an increase to $25 billion by 2014 from $12 billion today. The study also found that 25% of CPG purchases are researched online where consumers look at retailer ads, search for deals, and find recommendations on social media sites. A whopping 97% of the time, the researched product is purchased online or in-store.

Yet online grocery shopping has remained a niche market, compared to many other categories like clothing, entertainment and home electronics. Can more CPG manufacturers and retailers take advantage of this emerging channel?

Scott Welty, vice president, retail industry strategy at JDA Software in Scottsdale, Ariz., sees challenges and opportunities on the road to growth in grocery ecommerce. He offers these signposts:

Social Media
Procter & Gamble’s recent reentry into ecommerce via Facebook is a new example of how important social media is becoming to CPG companies. Consider the continued growth of the prosumer — a recently coined word combining “professional” and “consumer.” They want to be able to produce, leverage and consume content. They don’t want to listen to the retailer or to the manufacturer, but to their friends or peers online.

Additionally, marketers need to look at the teenagers of today to get insight into the potential customer of tomorrow. Within 10 years, they will become mass market shoppers. Those people want one portal. The retail giants of the world will need to adjust because the trend in many industries is consumers getting in closer relationships directly with manufacturers.

Segmentation
Despite the vastness of the online opportunity, companies are going to have to tailor that shopping experience because the number of SKUs. The number of purchases of fast-moving consumer goods will dictate the need to have to segment programs, customers and promotions. There’s too much information and there are way too many products.

Opening Keynote speaker Keith Anderson, Senior Analyst at the RetailNet Group predicts:

There’s a lot of 2011 left, but here’s a “pre- post-mortem” based on what I’ve seen so far and what I expect to see before year-end:

• Smartphones went mainstream (> 50% adoption by year-end), and tablets proved optimal for e-commerce
• Amazon was prioritized as a customer by suppliers, a competitor by retailers, and a target by regulators
• Multichannel retailers embraced online-offline integration and invested to make sites and stores support each other
• CPG retailers and brands realized that digital influence (marketing) is as important as e-commerce (retailing)
• Everyone realized that business model viability depends on context, and that the world looks very different for Peapod, Amazon Fresh, FreshDirect, Wag.com, and Petflow today than it did for Webvan, Pets.com and Kozmo a decade ago

There will be much more to talk about at the conference, but that’s a pretty good start.

Learn more from Anderson at the conference:

The Smarter Shopper: Marketing to the Digital Consumer
Tue – Wed, September 20-21, 2011
Stamford, CT
Register now >
Don’t forget – Use the code “digitalcpg” at registration for a 10% discount just for DigitalCPG.com readers!

Opening Keynote speaker Keith Anderson, Senior Analyst at the RetailNet Group responds:

For the first phase of e-commerce (essentially the last 15 years), most business models were based on the assumption that e-commerce was a substitute for physical retail.

For some shoppers, categories, and trips, it is—and will increasingly be over the next decade. But driving the next phase of e-commerce innovation is the idea that online-offline integration can be even more transformational. We’re about to undergo a major transition from the majority of shopping experiences being “pure-analog” to the majority being digitally-influenced.

One of my clients, a multichannel retailer among the largest in the country, told me this week that around half of the traffic to their site is from shoppers looking for information about the store—operating hours, local events & promotions, or doing product research.

Mobile search, proximity-driven offers, and local inventory transparency will increasingly influence outlet choice. List-building and list management apps will have major impacts on basket size and mix. Ratings and reviews are already often a factor in brand or SKU choice.

It’s also increasingly common to see retailers offer an “endless aisle” via in-store kiosks or tablets. So retailers aren’t just supporting their stores with their sites, they’re supporting their sites with their stores.

Some in the CPG industry think that e-commerce is only relevant to high-involvement categories like electronics and media like books, music, and video.

But we have hard data that shows that shoppers will increasingly use technology to make key decisions—or let the technology make the decisions for them.

Learn more from Anderson at the conference:

The Smarter Shopper: Marketing to the Digital Consumer
Tue – Wed, September 20-21, 2011
Stamford, CT
Register now >
Don’t forget – Use the code “digitalcpg” at registration for a 10% discount just for DigitalCPG.com readers!