The document discusses the evolution of social marketing from brand-to-consumer (B2C) approaches to consumer-to-consumer (C2C) approaches. It outlines how C2C marketing utilizes customer advocates to generate word-of-mouth referrals, stories, and recommendations that are amplified through social networks. Case studies demonstrate how C2C marketing can boost sales, referrals, awareness, and ROI. The case study of TastingRoom.com specifically shows how their C2C program increased social referrals, coupon sharing, and earned stories on consumers' social timelines.
We enable brand and agencies to turn existing customers into social advocates that promote the brand to their social graphs, tapping into the power of social referrals.We help brands and agencies identify advocates and then empower and incentivize them to share stories and refer new customers.We were founded in 2009 and are based in San Francisco, CA with over 90 employees. To date, we power social referrals for over 250 brandsWe’re part of the Facebook Preferred Developer Community and a member of WOMMA – the word of mouth marketing association
Consumer behavior is changing more rapidly than ever before. Consumers are sharing more online every day – whether it updates, posts, shares, photos or +1sMark Zuckerberg predicts that the amount of consumer sharing online will continue to double year over yearThe reach of social networks is staggering. The latest comScore report shows that social networking sites reach 82% of the world’s online population. That’s 1.2 B users worldwide1 in 5 minutes spent online is spent social networkingAt the same time, consumers trust recommendations from their friends and peers more than they trust brand advertising which has an impact on purchase cyclesAccording to Forrester, 80% of purchase cycles involve some form of WOM recommendationThe reach of WOM and consumer sharing is further amplified with the release of Facebook’s Open Graph which creates and broadcasts consumer stories across Facebook.Lead-in: WHAT DOES THIS MEAN….?
What this means is that there is a massive new marketing opportunity for companies. Traditional B2C or B2B marketing approaches push out brand content to the market – whether via traditional channels – print, TV, radio, billboard, digital channels – search, display, or even social networks. When brands began to build out their presence on social networks (specifically Facebook), they started with Social Media Listening tools that allow brands to listen to all the social activity around your brand. Then the focus shifted to brand pages where brands to have a bigger presence on Facebook and other social networks. They then invested in driving fans and likes. But all of these were really traditional brand-to-consumer approaches and companies have struggleD to see the value of these social marketing investments.Where we see social marketing evolving into is for marketers to harness the reach of their social advocates and foster consumer-to-consumer, social stories about their brand, products and services. This generates trusted WOM referrals and amplifies reach.
Word of mouth has always been a high-value marketing channel for brands; however, there wasn’t an easy way to automate and measure this traditionally offline process. With the increasing amount of consumer online sharing and conversations brands have a new opportunity:Brands identify advocates, empower and incentivize them to share “stories” (referrals, offers and expressions) about their brand. Advocates share these storiesStories are broadcast across channels – Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn, Email and more. This results in social amplification of the story out to the advocates’ friendsFriends receive trusted recommendations and either purchase, redeem, or register – which restarts the cycle as these new customers in turn become advocates themselves.The C2C Marketing process results in measurable social results – new high-value leads and sales, increased traffic and awareness – including improved search based on the social content generated, social insight and ROIAnd the entire process amplifies over time
C2C Social Marketing drives measurable results – not just likes and followers.Increased Acquisition and Sales with Trusted ReferralsIncreased volume of new leadsHigher value sales with higher AOV (2-3x) and higher customer LTVHigher conversion rates (3-5x over other channels) – according to WOMMA2) Increased Traffic and Awareness Increased shares in the social graphNew referral traffic to brand.com websiteImproved advertising with the powerful user-generated social content that creates earned media3) Better Social Insight and Measurable ROIUnderstanding the performance and ROI of your programBetter understanding of customers, advocates, sharing and channelsAnd visibility into the level of reach and amplification the earned stories have across social channels
C2C social marketing yields measurable social marketing ROI with improved results across the entire marketing funnel including: awareness, referral rate, conversion rate, customer acquisition and average order value (AOV).•Entertainment brand drove creation of 2.3M stories through advocate sharing in less than a year.•Consumer Electronics brand (Roku) increased customer referral rate by 30% in 6 months•Health & Beauty Brand: (Folica)– Social Referral Program, drove a 16% conversion rate for the program compared to an average 2.9% eCommerce conversion rate over a 30 day period•Financial Services brand – Social Referral Program, drove more than 5000 new customers in March 2012 through the program, currently, they are adding more than 200 new customers a day through the referral program and their social referral program through Extole currently their #1 acquisition channel, driving more sales than any other channel.•Auto Parts Brand –Social Referral Program drove over $1M in Revenue already this year through our program with $500k in the first 150 days•Men’s Clothing Brand –Social Referral Program tapped into their advocates to promote their brand and drove a $350 AOV compared to their standard of $150
TastingRoom.com is an innovative new website that allows consumers to buy wine by the bottle, glass or a taste with a passionate customer base of wine enthusiasts. Wanting to tap into that customer base and get them to spread the word about the new site and the unique wine tasting options, TastingRoom was looking for a strategic social marketing partner. They embedded C2C programs throughout their customer experience – a referral program, social coupon and social expressions
Let’s start with the referral program – advocates are offered $25 for every referral plus 50% off a premium wine sampler for sharing with friends. Advocates are rewarded when friends purchase.Back to my point about making sharing easy, advocates can share with friends via email, Facebook, Twitter and PURL (their own URL that can be cut and paste into any communication channel – chat, text, etc)Brands can pre-populate sharing messages to make sharing easier and advocates can choose the default or write their own messages
This is an example of a Facebook share and highlights open graph integration
The referral program generates shares or stories that are viewed by friends. These stories are consumer-generated content that will continue to drive views, as well as SEO
This is an example of an Open Graph enabled Social Coupon. What you see here is a promotional placement on the brand’s home page.
This is an example of an Open Graph enabled Social Coupon. What you see here is a promotional placement on the brand’s home page.
Once the customer clicks on the “Claim with Facebook” button, the customer is then prompted with a permission screen which requests an app install. Once installed, the unique coupon code is revealed.
Then those actiomns are syndicated through the open graph
And lastly, this is an example of another type of sharing – a social expression – where consumers can share their feelings about products and services for a brand – in this case, want it, tried it, recommend