Facebook and f-commerce is really growing fast. As with most new ideas, they become widespread in the States, and then come to the UK. This is true of f-commerce too. Firms have successfully being deploying Facebook as a sales channel for some time now. Indeed, the top three brands on Facebook worldwide are already selling on Facebook; Disney, Coca-Cola and Starbucks.
The biggest UK success story so far is ASOS. Another notable success is Tesco, which generated over £2m in sales with Facebook vouchers for fans.
Give to receive:
Asos have over 540,000 followers as of this morning on Facebook. These have been acquired over the past 2 years or so. How? Through a committed and consistent strategy of providing interested parties with relevant content, special offers, insight into the fashion industry, and so on. Following on from this, followers are empowered to share all of this with their networks. They can contribute their own comments and be involved with the development of the brand too. These too “social” elements facilitate commercial transactions considerably.
Altered Attitudes required:
Not everyone is a big fan of f-commerce. In comparison to the potential of m-commerce for example, many are keen to point out that the potential market size is a mere drop in the ocean comparatively. For every success story, there are numerous failures.
But I think Facebook has it all. For a start, it is invariably where your customers are. Facebook has over 500m users; half of which log-on every day.
So perhaps companies need to show a little more patience with Facebook. Amazon and ebay were once “small businesses” with no real chance of making the grade, and changing our buying patterns. Facebook has a huge headstart over these two in terms of customer base, and selling features. ASOS gave people content to share over a long-period..it is only now they can start to turn this into a sales platform.
Loyalty and advocacy need to be nurtured. Thinking your product is great, and then simply telling people to buy it, will not grow your business in the social media space.