The evolution of social commerce

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 ‘Commerce’ before it was ‘social’?

If you can remember the first retail websites in the mid ‘90s they were pretty boring, nothing more than online versions of printed brochures that took ages to download on your dial-up modem. It wasn’t until companies like Pegasus, eBay and Amazon identified the potential of ecommerce to disintermediate traditional retail, that shopping was forever changed. But that was...

20 March 2015 | Commerce

Facebook’s new patent allows marketing to the most influential

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Trying to distinguish the influencers and experts among a sea of social media content consumers has always been tough, but the fact that Facebook has now patented a new way of doing it is likely to mean big change for the digital marketing industry.

The patent – entitled ‘Identify experts and influencers in a social network’ was granted this week, four years after first being submitted by Facebook ads boss Andrew Bosworth in...

18 February 2015 | Commerce

Retailers struggling to come to terms with unified commerce

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Retailers have long struggled with disparate, legacy systems that have hampered their ability to integrate true omni-channel strategies.

Yet despite the recognition that a unified commerce platform can pay dividends, little more than half of retailers (53%) expect to implement a unified commerce platform in the next few years. However over the next ten years 86% of retailers plan to implement a unified commerce platform.

The...

3 February 2015 | Commerce

Flipboard launches new Promoted Items function for advertisers

Marketers can finally look to distribute their content more widely on Flipboard after it announced the introduction of a new tool called Promoted Items this week.

From the beginning of February Levi’s and NARS Cosmetics will become two of the first brands to distribute content on Flipboard via the new Promoted Items feed. Such content – which can range from articles, videos, products or photos – will be incorporated into the Flipboard experience but will clearly be...

22 January 2015 | Commerce

Social business predictions show big change for marketing tech

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Companies face a number of challenges in their social transformation over the next few years. However, a new report from IDC reveals the ten factors it feels will influence decision making around social business. Many of which involve the evolution of marketing technology.

In IDC FutureScape: Worldwide Social Business Transformation 2015 predictions, the report’s authors say that business leaders should be making such decisions within...

6 January 2015 | Advertising

Where does social commerce go after 2014?

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2014 felt like the movie Groundhog Day. Wake up to the sounds of the song, I Got You Babe (or, in this case, Pharrell’s just-as-incessant ‘Happy’), then open your news provider of choice to read about yet another social network launching a ‘Buy’ button.

Pinterest in January, Facebook in July, Twitter in September - frankly, it was a surprise not to see WhatsApp reinvented as a social assistant that reads your texts, hacks...

23 December 2014 | Commerce

What will be the big trends for data-driven marketing in 2015?

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In 2014 online retail sales in the UK rose by 15.8% in 2014 (fetching a healthy £45 billion ). In 2015 this figure is expected to grow even further, increasing a burgeoning part of the UK’s economic recovery.

This rise in sales is not just due to global economic factors technology advances in data-driven marketing, mobile and in-store technology have truly transformed online storefronts and the local high-street.

2014 was...

18 December 2014 | Automation

How millennials are buying into social commerce

Experts predict the value of social commerce is set to explode but inevitably it will be the millennial generation who will ignite the explosion.

Millennials are a generation that cannot be ignored since it is estimated that this market will have a combined purchasing power of $2.45 trillion worldwide by 2015, $30 billion of which will be in the US.

A new study from the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth suggests that buy buttons on social networks will be particularly...

4 December 2014 | Commerce

Counting the cost of Black Friday as crowds swarm retailers

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So Black Friday is upon us and the marketing hype has done its job it seems as even before 6am this morning there were reports of crazed scuffles for bargains and retail websites crashing under the strain. 

But the real question has to be what will the true cost of Black Friday be? Everyone loves a bargain, especially before Christmas when you can make the excuse that you are buying presents. Of course whether Aunt Maude actually wanted a...

28 November 2014 | Advertising