Earlier this week, I attended Business Insider‘s Social Commerce Summit, where Allyson Hugley, Weber Shandwick’s EVP of Measurement, Analytics & Insights, took part in a panel on social commerce ROI. (I live-tweeted the best comments from the entire day at @webershandwick, where they are archived.)
Allyson spoke about catalyzing sales through social sharing, along with Dave Thomas of Radian6, Kip Levin of TicketMaster, and Tim Mahlman from Klout.
Some key points that Allyson (second left in the picture at right) made:
- Social commerce requires compelling, relevant content – and not just content about the product. Parallel content, addressing topics related to the merchandise (e.g. a food brand creating content around recipes, parties, dealing with kids who are picky eaters), can help drive sales.
- This parallel content can help demonstrate the huge opportunity for brands in their owned media, which must be integrated with earned and paid. There is much ground to be gained in owned media for brands, whether it’s on their blogs, livestreaming video events, or other platforms.
- Key to measuring social commerce ROI is a strong relationship between agency and brand. Agencies have to work with clients at varying levels of social commerce maturity and tailor their efforts accordingly. In order to accurately track progress and data, the client has to feel comfortable sharing those details with the agency. Verifying ROI requires closing the data loop, and the agency/brand relationship is at the heart of shared learning and metrics measurement. You then have to iterate your approach based on what the data reveals, showing the client the logic behind your scrutiny and suggestions. All parties’ understanding of driving social commerce ROI should be heightened on an ongoing basis, based on your shared efforts.
The focus on the importance of content to social commerce – which we started talking about double-time during and since CES – was emphasized throughout the day’s conversations. Panelist after panelist, from both brands and media properties, urged marketers to be bold, to go “all in” with content, and prepare to yield half-baked results if they take a timid, toe-in-the-water approach to content and community. “Boring content is the enemy,” was a key theme of the day’s talks.
Is your brand being bold? Which brands do you see who are putting out risky content that seems to pay big dividends? And how central to your social commerce strategy is that relevant, compelling content?