There’s a useful post over at econsultancy by Eric Abensur of cloud-based commerce company Venda, that asks a simple, but very pertinent question, is social commerce worth the investment?

The short answer – according to the post – is a qualified yes, if retailers adopt the right approach and tone.

For the e-consultancy post, social commerce is not about turning social media into a marketplace, but using social media to promote the marketplace/site you’re selling on – essentially through social sharing. For instance, Etsy sellers use Pinterest for free advertising, and 20% of buyers come to the craft marketplace from seeing shared pics on Pinterest.  Use e-commerce software to sell, and social software to share. Simple, right?

But is that it? Is social commerce really just regular e-commerce with social sharing added in?  Well it’s certainly part of it.  Social commerce software solutions with traction - TurnTo, 8thBridge, AddShoppers, inSparq, Bazaarvoice, Lithium, Sellaround – are all increasingly focusing on adding premium social features to e-commerce solutions – with ratings and reviews, Social Q&A, social recommendations, and customizable share buttons leading the pack. This is social commerce as a plugin, or rather, a set of plugins – and yes, it is worth the investment.  Why? Because these social plugins for e-commerce sites are simple, time and cost-efficient ways to help retailers monetize the referral value of their customers – which can be up to 40% of total customer lifetime value. Social commerce as a plugin is a no-brainer.

But there’s more to social commerce than a plugin.  The opportunity is to use social commerce for business model innovation – using a social mindset to create and capture customer value in new and different ways.

• Tuangou (team buying) – selling to groups, not individuals (e.g. Mercedes has offered members of social networks the opportunity to club together an buy in bulk with group discounts)
• Pop-up Retail - using social media as a channel for selling limited editions. (e.g., this year Mercedes launched a special limited edition Smart Car sold only on the Chinese version of Twitter)
• Collaborative Consumption – selling stuff for sharing (e.g. Zipcar, AirBnB, Zopa)
• Collaborative Commerce – using social technology to manage supply chain alliances and collaboration. For example, last year luxury retail chain Neiman Marcus said it will put together a limited collection from 24 American designers this holiday season with an unlikely partner … discounter Target Corp

Social plugins are a good way to start with social commerce, they are worth the investment.  But the big wins will happen when companies adopt a social mindset to do business model innovation – by thinking we-commerce not me-commerce.  The future of social commerce will happen with business model innovation, not a plugin.

(Via Social Commerce Today)

Retailers are focusing their attention on mobile strategies to improve the customer experience. As many as 32% of consumers said that they have researched a product on their smartphone prior to purchasing item within the brick-and-mortar store, according to study conducted by Equation Research.

This infographic, courtesy of Mobiquity, highlights 6 retailers that rank the highest in overall customer mobile shopping experience, as well as the most significant reasons why consumers might be unsatisfied with a mobile experience.

(Via Strategies to Optimize Every Customer Interaction)

Demand for retailers to provide ethical products has grown in recent years, despite increasing pressure on household budgets caused by the recession, statistics show.

While grocer Asda’s recent Mumdex report revealed that almost half of mums were planning to spend less on Christmas last year and 48 per cent believed that their financial situation would worsen in 2013, Fairtrade research also showed that 40 per cent of people are now actively seeking out ethically-sourced products despite strained household finances.

It has been five years since the recession began, and in that time ethical markets have increased in value from £35.5 billion to £47.2 billion, according to the recent Co-operative Ethical Consumer Markets Report.

In response to increasing demand from customers, many retailers have drawn up plans to improve their performance on a whole host of ethical issues, sustainable sourcing being chief among them.

As well as monitoring the ethical market across the UK through the Ethical Consumer Markets Report, mutual retail & services business The Co-operative Group also works to meet ethical targets, such as creating a dedicated supply chain for milk, through ‘Our Ethical Plan’.

Commenting on the growing demand for ethical goods, a spokesperson for The Co-operative said: “The Ethical Consumer Markets Report shows that intervention by enlightened businesses, together with regulatory intervention, is driving ethical sales growth.

“During the downturn we have seen some of the biggest ever Fairtrade conversions, be it in chocolate or sugar, and business is beginning to respond to the challenge to provide consumers with more sustainable products and services such as fish, palm oil and soya.”

While recognising that ethical consumers are “a vitally important barometer of change” and that progressive businesses can also stimulate ethical markets, the spokesperson laid the bulk of the responsibility at the Government’s door, commenting: “Ultimately, over and above the efforts of responsible business and ethical consumers, sustainable solutions require a government committed to long term intervention.”

Richard Anstead, Fairtrade’s Head of Production Management, agreed that the Government has a responsibility to support ethical retailing and sustainable supply. With David Cameron hosting the G8 Summit in June 2013, Anstead told Retail Gazette that the Prime Minister has the opportunity to make a real difference.

Outlining his hopes, Anstead commented: “We would like to see the Government get behind helping smallholders and make a commitment to finding a solution to food scarcity in the world.

“If the Government channelled more support into agriculture in developing countries, it would be an opportunity to secure supply and make a difference to people’s lives.”

Securing the supply chain, which Anstead sees as “an investment for retailers”, was a key theme for Anstead as he discussed the progress which Fairtrade has made in recent years, as well as the obstacles which it has yet to overcome.

At present, 40 per cent of sugar in supermarkets is Fairtrade, and 30-35 per cent of bananas, although Fairtrade supporters The Co-operative and Sainsbury’s now stock only Fairtrade bananas.

Nestle has also recently announced that all two-finger Kit Kats will carry the Fairtrade mark from 2013, increasing the impact on farmers in Cote d’Ivoire who were already benefitting from the use of Fairtrade products in four-finger Kit Kats.

Moving forward, Anstead wishes to add to these successes, particularly through Fairtrade Fortnight, which will take place between Monday February 25th and Sunday March 10th 2013.

“We are challenging retailers to make noise in stores so the message can really resonate in the retail environment,” he explained.

“One of the biggest opportunities for people to find out about Fairtrade is in stores because that’s where people discover and buy our products.”

One retailer with strong connections to Fairtrade is supermarket Sainsbury’s, which launched its 20×20 Sustainability Plan in 2011, setting out 20 targets relating to sustainability, community action and protecting the environment which should be achieved by 2020.

Echoing Anstead’s comments about the importance of the supply chain, Sally Uren, Deputy CEO of Forum for the Future said: “In order to continue in the success to date, Sainsbury’s needs a sustainable food system around it.

“It just isn’t possible to be sustainable and successful into the long-term if the system around you is broken.

“Sainsbury’s has done some of the best work I’ve seen in the UK on sustainable agriculture, so what I’d love to see is that work scaled up in the UK and beyond, and for Sainsbury’s not only to feed the nation in a sustainable way but help create a sustainable food system.”

Sainsbury’s CEO Justin King has argued that the retailer’s targets are “significant and stretching”, and that although there is a long journey ahead, achievements have already been made.

In December 2012, Sainsbury’s distributed £1.2 million in funding to projects dedicated to driving the future of British farming, including initiatives to extend the British strawberry season and improve the quality of Aberdeen Angus beef, and the supermarket is also the largest retailer of Marine Stewardship Council certified fish.

Research into the impact of the 20×20 plan has revealed that Sainsbury’s customers have adopted “new-fashioned values” since the onset of the recession, and are unwilling to sacrifice their principles despite the need for a cheaper price.

Neil Saunders, Managing Director of analyst firm Conlumino, confirmed that consumers want to be ethical, but told us that “price does remain the number one consideration.”

“If they can find a cheaper product elsewhere that is not ethical then people that are constrained financially probably will trade away because they will see it as being important just to get the product,” he added.

Commenting that increasing availability of ethical products and subsequent reductions in the price of these products are the main reasons for the booming ethical market, he said: “What we don’t know of course is how much it might have grown by if there hadn’t been a downturn, because I’m sure the downturn has slowed down the growth rate.”

Saunders added that, while the growth rate will eventually slow as the market reaches maturity, 2013 is set to be a year of significant growth in ethical retailing.

By Julie Fisher, Retailgazette

 

“The New Science of Pleasure,” a new paper by Daniel L. McFadden, reviews how psychology, biology, and neurology are ganging up on economics to prove that, when it comes to making decisions, people are anything but rational.

Abstract
The neoclassical view of consumers as relentless egoistic maximizers is challenged by evidence from cognitive psychology, anthropology, evolutionary biology, and neurology. This paper begins by surveying the development of neoclassical consumer theory and the measurement of welfare, and expansions to encompass preference fields, nonlinear budgets, hedonic goods and household production, and consumption dynamics. Following this, it reviews the newer evidence on consumer behavior, and what this implies for the measurement of consumer beliefs, intentions, preferences, choices, and well-being.

The Atlantic’s Derek Thompson interviewed the author.

“Neither the physiology of pleasure nor the methods we use to make choices are as simple or as single-minded as the classical economists thought. A lot of behavior is consistent with pursuit of self-interest, but in novel or ambiguous decision-making environments there is a good chance that our habits will fail us and inconsistencies in the way we process information will undo us.”

(Via Putting people first)

A Chris Anderson tuve la oportunidad de conocerlo en el año 2006, cuando me tocó presentarlo en una charla en el Recommenders de Bilbao: acababa de publicar “The long tail“, un libro que me parece que ha jugado un papel muy importante en la comprensión de muchas cosas que hemos visto pasar a lo largo de los últimos años. Pues bien, su último libro, “Makers“, es de los que hacen afición. Y que lo califique como tal en el título de la entrada no es solamente una forma de hablar: a medida que lo lees, te entra una curiosidad enorme por probar cosas, por hacerlas, por experimentar. Llevaba bastantes años sin manejar un soldador… me compré uno hace unos días. Y entre eso, el Raspberry Pi, una placa Arduino y algunas cosas más que ya contaré en cuanto sean algo más tangibles, me he montado una especie de hacklab en casa que parece el laboratorio de Dexter (si me echan de casa, no descartéis que pida asilo político en casa de algún lector habitual

Pero el libro va mucho más allá de fomentar una afición que llevaba tiempo rumiando, y es mucho, mucho más ambicioso que la simple idea de la fabricación en modo hobby: habla de una auténtica transición histórica. De una transición comparable en su magnitud a la Revolución Industrial, de una verdadera fuerza transformadora en forma de continuación lógica que fluye como consecuencia de la transformación digital que va a redefinir la forma en la que hacemos muchas cosas.

La idea puede entenderse con una cita:

The digital revolution has been largely limited to screens. We love screens, of course, on our laptops, our TVs, our phones. But we live in homes, drive in cars, and work in offices. We are surrounded by physical goods, most of them products of a manufacturing economy that over the past century has been transformed in all ways but one: unlike the Web, it hasn’t been opened to all. Because of the expertise, equipment, and costs of producing things on a large scale, manufacturing has been mostly the provenance of big companies and trained professionals. That’s about to change.

El libro define de qué manera se está produciendo ese cambio. Los síntomas, los casos de éxito, las herramientas que lo están provocando, el open hardware, la reinvención de los procesos industriales en niveles que van desde el garaje a las enormes factorías de la industria de automoción, la evolución hacia la fabricación personalizada, las fuentes de financiación… el capítulo 10, “Financing the Maker movement”, dedicado entre otras cosas a Kickstarter es un auténtico bonus track, de esos que cualquier emprendedor o persona que se plantee llegar a serlo en algún momento debe leer.

En torno a este tema se están moviendo muchas cosas: impresoras y escáneres 3D, cortadoras láser, máquinas de control numérico, hardware abierto, electrónica… muchos conceptos que están generando auténticas caídas de barreras de entrada que habían permanecido ahí desde la Revolución Industrial, que impedían hacer demasiadas cosas si no se tenía una escala determinada. El libro provoca unas ganas enormes de asomarse al mundo de los hacklabs, donde muchas de estas herramientas se ponen a disposición de los usuarios junto con algo de adiestramiento en su uso. En mi caso, tuve la suerte, además, de que la exploración de estos temas coincidiese en el tiempo con la lectura del libro: el pasado lunes pude experimentar varias de estas tecnologías en el TechShop Detroit de Allen Park, una iniciativa financiada por Ford que define en muchos sentidos una de las frases que me llamó la atención en el capítulo 8 del libro, que permite ver cómo el cambio va mucho más allá del simple hobby y del fabricar estatuillas en plástico fundido, y que tiene todo un punto de gracia que te coincida leerlo cuando precisamente visitas Detroit:

There’ no manufacturing business like the car business. If that can be transformed, anything can. 

Desde el movimiento DIY, Do It Yourself, hasta modelos como Etsy, hasta llegar a las fábricas en la nube, al Alibaba.com de Jack Ma o a los nuevos planteamientos en la industria de la automoción, incluso con derivaciones macroeconómicas de calado sobre las ventajas comparativas de los países y el peso de la mano de obra en los procesos. Está pasando algo muy, muy gordo, y este libro me ha parecido una muy buena manera de entrar en contacto y de tener algo de criterio sobre ello. Puedes leer mis subrayados del libro en mi página de Kindle.com. Recomendación total y entusiasta. No digáis que no he avisado

(Via El Blog de Enrique Dans)

In 2003, while the music industry was threatening and suing over digital downloading and file sharing, Apple quietly launched iTunes and forever revolutionized the way we consume music.  Today the idea of buying 10 songs on a disc, only to get the one song you really like seems almost ridiculous.  One short decade later, iTunes represents 29% of all music sold at retail (both digital and physical).  Meanwhile, record stores like HMV are sinking into bankruptcy.

Now, another consumer revolution is waiting at the gates. And it’s the revolution of  3-D printing.   The question is, who will own this moment in history?  Who will lead this revolution and just as important, who will die trying to suppress it?

Only a few years ago, 3-D printers were far too expensive for the consumer market, but now it’s possible to buy one for under $2,000. Given the growing ease and affordability of this technology, it seems completely reasonable to expect that within the next decade, we (consumers) will routinely produce a percentage of the items that we need on a weekly basis, from the comfort of our homes. It will be commonplace to download 3-D product designs and print them locally, including toys, household items, art, decorative items, equipment, parts and hundreds of other common products.

Some analysts have argued that the problem with this imagined future lies in the high cost of the process and in particular the feed stock material used in it.  A common item, say a plate, for example, would be on the order of 30 times more expensive to print than it would be to buy in a store.  On the other hand, 3-D printer manufacturer MakerBot has offered examples of being able to print small items, like an iPhone case for example, that might cost upwards of $20.00 in a store, for only a few cents. We can also logically assume a steady drop in the cost of both 3-D printers and feed stock material as the technology is more widely adopted and as competition in the category grows.

So, consider the math from a retailer’s point of view.  One item purchased and scanned could potentially end up being shared to hundreds or even thousands of consumers who then simply print an identical replica for which the retailer and manufacturer receive nothing. The economic impact on the brands that design and make such items could be staggering. Indeed 3-D printing has the potential to be a consumer revolution that will make the disruption caused by music sharing look like a walk in the park!

Which leads me to the question, how is the industry likely to react?  In what will seem like deja vu, I fully expect manufacturers and retailers alike to terrorize consumers and to litigate the hell out of them.  They will fight tooth and nail to protect the status quo – that being that manufacturers do the making, retailers handle the selling and consumers… well, consumers simply buy what’s made available to them.  Brands will struggle in vain to defend their existing wholesale and retail business models. And they’ll fail to see that the horses are already out of the barn.  There will be no going back once consumers have been empowered to produce what they want, when they want it.

But like Steve Jobs, my guess is that someone (perhaps Apple or Amazon) will emerge who recognizes the true opportunity that lies ahead.  The opportunity to aggregate, curate and sell individual product designs at reasonable prices to consumers, who can simply and legally download them for in-home production.  Like iTunes, they’ll envision a digital marketplace made up of tens of thousands of products across a multitude of categories. In other words, they won’t resist the trend, they’ll enable it and grow it.

And just like record labels and iTunes, brands and manufacturers will have the option of either playing along for a percentage of the action or continuing to fight over 100 percent of nothing.  They’ll have little choice but to evolve their business model beyond simply selling finished products to retailers and begin licensing their product designs to consumers as well.  And yes, it will completely and permanently alter their revenue streams.

There’s no escaping the emerging reality that we are entering a new era where the customer is no longer merely a consumer but a manufacturer in their own right.

Look for my book, The Retail Revival coming February 28, 2013

The post The Next Consumer Revolution: iTunes for Products appeared first on.

(Via Retail Prophet)