DIGITAL RETAIL CONFERENCE
Social Sales
Ben Carter, Marketing Director at
Notonthehighstreet.com and Head of Digital Marketing Fiona Wallin, tell us why social media is about more than engagement
Q: What are some of the key objectives of
Notonthehighstreet.com's social strategy - which channels do you fi nd most effective, and what sort of content works? Our social strategy is divided into two very distinct strands of activity with completely separate objectives: content syndication to drive engagement, and direct response activity to drive purchases. From a channel perspective, both
Facebook and Twitter have proved incredibly successful platforms for both components of our social strategy, with our Facebook direct response (DR) activity now rivalling PPC in terms of the ROI we can generate. Our success on the engagement piece has been to learn what content our users fi nd engaging and useful, and to syndicate this at the right time, whilst effective targeting and an agile, test-and-learn approach has
been the key to driving the results we’ve seen from the DR activity.
Q: We tend to think of social media as a channel for increasing visibility and driving brand awareness rather than as a sales channel. Is that right, or can it do both? It can absolutely do both, if used in the right way. Social media is now a viable sales channel for us as a business and we run always-on, DR-focused activity that delivers
Buy Line: THE EVOLUTION OF ONLINE RETAIL
tem is demonstrated by UK inventor Michael Aldrich.
First online shopping sys- 1979
installs the fi rst B2B online shopping system.
Thomson Holidays UK 1981
place: a CD of Ten Summoner's Tales by Sting goes for £7.74 at NetMarket.
The fi rst secure online retail transaction takes
1994 31 issue 24 may 2015 broken laser pointer.
Amazon and eBay launch. First item sold on eBay is a
1995
Hotmail launches. AT&T launch the fi rst net-enabled mobile phone.
1996
ROI in line with our well established, traditional DR channels.
Q: Given the enormous amount of content presented to us all on social media every day, is reaching your consumers a challenge, and if so how do you achieve cut-through? Reaching our consumers with our engagement-focused content has defi nitely become more challenging, particularly since the changes to Facebook’s algorithm came into play last year. Effi cient use of paid amplifi cation, overlaid with effective targeting, has been successful for us in terms of getting cut-through and reaching the right users at the times when they are most likely to engage.
Q: What do you see as the biggest social media issues facing online retailers in 2015? The social landscape has become very crowded and noisy, and that combined with platforms limiting the organic reach of content has made it diffi cult for brands to gain visibility and really stand out. The volume of content available to users online is huge - it’s really key for brands to ensure that what they are putting out there is useful and engaging to ensure they don’t get lost amongst the competition.
Q: Any quick takeaways for retailers who want to increase their social media effectiveness on a budget? Establishing clear objectives then ongoing testing and targeting have been the two key factors that have allowed us to deliver success with a conservative budget. There are so many targeting possibilities and different ad formats available that it’s imperative to determine what works for your business to ensure that budget is being spent effectively.
notonthehighstreet.com
Social media is now a viable sales channel for us
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68
