Optimize Social Commerce with Product Data and Digital Assets
- Social commerce is growing rapidly, but it can be tricky to properly capitalize on its potential.
- With the right product data and digital assets, you can optimize social commerce and drive sales.
- Make the most of your social selling opportunities with our helpful tips on optimizing social commerce with product data and digital assets.
In this Article
As the world continues to become more and more digital, businesses have had to adapt in order to survive. One of the most important changes that businesses have had to make is incorporating social commerce into the traditional eCommerce model. This new model is increasingly becoming important for eCommerce businesses as people increasingly spend their time on social media. According to figures aggregated by Statista, global social commerce sales are projected to close at about 990 billion US Dollars through 2022. This will rise even faster in the years ahead, signaling that the era of social commerce is officially entrenched.
This article discusses the optimization of social commerce with product data and digital assets. Read on to turbo charge your social commerce efforts.
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What is social commerce?
Social commerce is a term that refers to the use of social media platforms to facilitate the buying and selling of products or services. It’s essentially e-commerce that takes place on social media platforms.
While traditional eCommerce marketplaces like Amazon and eBay have long allowed users to purchase items through eCommerce websites, social commerce takes things one step further by incorporating features that allow for more interaction and engagement between buyers and sellers. For example, many social commerce platforms allow users to leave reviews and ratings for products, which can help other users to make more informed purchasing decisions.
In addition, social commerce platforms often offer users the ability to connect with other users who have similar interests, making the entire experience more social and engaging. Ultimately, social commerce provides a more immersive and interactive shopping experience that can be tailored to the individual user’s needs and preferences.
Social commerce is a rapidly growing field that combines the power of social media marketing with the convenience of online shopping.
Advantages of Social Commerce
There are a number of advantages that social commerce delivers to businesses. Here are the most prominent benefits.
1. Increased Reach
Social media platforms have billions of users, which gives businesses a vast potential customer base. By selling products on social media, businesses can reach a larger audience than they would if they were only using traditional brick-and-mortar stores or pure eCommerce platforms. With traditional eCommerce, businesses are limited to reaching only those people who visit their website or store. However, with social commerce, businesses can reach most of those who are active on the social media platform that they’re using. This gives them a much larger potential customer base.
2. Better Engagement
Social media users are more likely to interact with brands that they follow, making social commerce an ideal way to build relationships with customers. By selling products on social media, businesses can develop a deeper connection with their audience and create loyalty among their customer base. With traditional e-commerce, businesses may interact with their customers through customer service channels, but they don’t really have the opportunity to build deeper relationships. On social media, however, businesses can interact with their customers on a more personal level. This can help to build trust and loyalty among customers, which can eventually lead to more sales.
3. Smart Insights
In today’s business world, one of the most valuable assets is customer data. And social media platforms provide businesses with valuable data about their customers, including demographics, interests, and purchase history. This information can be used to tailor marketing messages and product offerings to better meet the needs of millions of customers in social platforms. By understanding who your customers are, what they’re interested in, and what they’re likely to purchase, you are better placed to fulfill their needs. Through platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, you can learn a great deal about your target audience and develop campaigns that are more likely to resonate with customers. In an increasingly competitive marketplace, the ability to timely collect and effectively use customer data to derive actionable insights can be the difference between success and failure.
How to Optimize Social Commerce with Product Data
Product data refers to the various types of information that describe a product. This information can include the product’s name, price, manufacturer, dimensions, and more. It is often used by retailers to help customers make informed purchasing decisions. These days, eCommerce product information is best managed by PIM software, which is exceptionally good for storing and organizing information about multiple products. It can also be used to track changes in pricing or product descriptions and to generate product readiness reports.
Here are the various ways you can use product data to optimize social commerce:
1. Targeted content
Content is key for driving traffic to your social commerce channels. By using product data, you can create content that is specifically targeted to your target audience. This will help to ensure that your content is relevant and engaging, and that it drives traffic to your site.
Start by understanding what your target audience is looking for, then create content that they will find valuable and relevant. For example, if you are selling shoes, you can use product data to determine what kind of shoes your target audience is interested in. Then, you can create content around that topic. If you do this effectively, you will be able to successfully engage your target audience and convert them into customers.
2. Improving user experience
Your product data can help you to identify areas where the user experience can be improved on your social commerce. Making changes based on this data ensures that users have a better experience, and that they are more likely to convert into buying customers.
Look out for the following:
- Return rates: If customers are returning a lot of products, that’s a sign that there may be an issue with the user experience.
- Channel time: Look at how long customers are spending on each social channel. If they’re quickly leaving after viewing a product, that indicates that they’re not finding what they’re looking for or that the page is confusing to navigate.
3. Troubleshooting issues
If you are having problems with your social commerce channels, your product data can be a valuable tool for troubleshooting these issues. By identifying patterns in the data, you can often pinpoint the source of the problem and find a solution more quickly.
Here are some good examples of patterns to watch out for:
- Incomplete or inaccurate product information. This can lead to customers not being able to find what they’re looking for, or ordering the wrong product.
- Out-of-date product information. This can result in customers seeing products that are no longer available, or that have changed in price or features.
- Inconsistent product information across platforms. If customers see different information about a product on different social media platforms, it can create confusion and mistrust.
- Poorly written or designed product descriptions. This can make it difficult for customers to understand what a product is, and whether it meets their needs.
- Lack of customer reviews or ratings. This can make it harder for potential customers to judge the quality of a product and may lead them to choose a competitor’s product instead.
Being aware of these patterns puts you in a better position to provide a smooth and enjoyable experience for your customers.
4. Optimizing conversions
Ultimately, the goal of social commerce is to drive sales and conversions. By analyzing your product data, you can identify which products are most likely to convert users into customers. You can then focus your efforts on promoting these products, and increasing their visibility. This will help to increase your overall conversion rate, and drive more sales for your business.
Use these data points:
- Product pageviews: This metric tells you how many people are viewing what product on social platforms. If you see a decline in views, it could be an indication that your products are not as appealing to customers as they used to be. To address this, you may need to update your product descriptions and photos, or offer discounts or promotions.
- Add-to-cart rate: This metric measures how often people who view your product pages add items to their cart. If your add-to-cart rate is low, it could mean that your products are not priced competitively, or that the overall shopping experience is not good enough.
- Checkout rate: This metric tells you how often people who add items to their cart actually go through with the purchase. If your checkout rate is low, it could be an indication that your checkout process is too complicated or time-consuming. Streamlining your checkout process can help increase your conversion rate.
- Average order value: This metric measures the average amount of money customers spend when they make a purchase on your social commerce channel. If you want to increase your average order value, you can do so by offering discounts for larger orders, or by upselling and cross-selling complementary products.
How to Optimize Social Commerce with Digital Assets
A digital asset is any type of file that can be stored and accessed electronically and acts as a visual asset to your product. This includes everything from images and videos to documents and social media posts. In the business world, digital assets are often used for marketing and advertising purposes. For example, a company might use an image of its product in an online ad, or a video clip in a TV commercial. By investing in high-quality digital assets, businesses can ensure that their marketing materials are professional and eye-catching. Furthermore, well-designed digital assets can help to build brand awareness and credibility. Modern digital assets for eCommerce companies are best managed by DAM solutions.
Here are the different ways you can use digital assets to create a more effective social commerce experience:
1. Use High-Quality Product Images
Quality product images are essential for any eCommerce website, but they are especially important in social commerce. The majority of social media users are young people who are highly visual. They are attracted to images that are exciting and well-designed, and they are more likely to convert if they see a great image of the product. On the contrary, a dull image is likely to put them off and may never buy the product even if the quality is top notch. Make sure to use clear, high-resolution images that accurately represent the product.
Avoid using generic stock photos, as these will not give potential customers an accurate idea of what they are buying. Use multiple images to show different angles and details of the product, and make sure to include at least one close-up shot.
2. Use Engaging Video Content
Videos are a great way to show off products in use and give potential customers a better sense of what they’re buying. If you can capture their imagination and be excited along the way, you’ll easily convert them to buy your products. Use engaging and creative videos that capture attention and drive conversions.
Videos have advanced from items of mere entertainment and now have become a great way to show off products and give potential customers a better sense of what they are buying. Like images, videos are equally huge in social commerce, and many people are now exposed to videos on a daily basis.
In fact, many social media users, especially the young generation, spend a lot of time daily in their social media accounts watching thrilling videos. If you can capture their imagination with an engaging and creative video, you will likely convert them into a customer – thanks to video content.
Videos that are exciting and capable of capturing attention are more likely to drive conversions. When creating videos to showcase your products, be sure to keep this in mind. Engage your audience and create excitement around your product to increase the chances of making a sale.
3. Use Customer Testimonials
Customer testimonials are a valuable digital asset when packaged well. By definition, customer testimonials are recommendations that a customer leaves on a company’s product or services. In the context of social commerce, customer testimonials can play an important role in helping potential customers make purchase decisions. For one, customer testimonials provide an unbiased and honest account of what it is like to use a particular product or service. In addition, customer testimonials can help to build trust and credibility with potential customers. Finally, customer testimonials help to create a sense of social proof, which can be very persuasive when it comes to making purchase decisions.
Use these creative ways to package your customer testimonials into a powerful digital asset for social commerce success:
- Make a video compilation: gather a selection of your best customer testimonials and turn them into a short video clip. This is an engaging way to showcase your satisfied customers and their positive experiences with your product or service.
- Create a social media campaign: feature customer testimonials prominently in a social media campaign. This will help to spread the word about your business and generate interest in what you have to offer.
- Write a blog post: write a blog post featuring customer testimonials and share this blog post on social media.
- Create an infographic: turn customer testimonials into an eye-catching infographic and share it to your followers across the different social media channels that you use. This is a great way to display information in a visually appealing way that is easy for people to understand and share.
- Design a landing page: use customer testimonials to create an effective landing page on your social commerce channels. This can help to increase conversion rates by convincing visitors that your product or service is worth their time and money.
4. Reuse Existing Assets
By leveraging existing digital assets, you can save time and money while still delivering high-quality material to your audience. For example, if you have a thread on Twitter or a post on Facebook that you realize is performing well, consider turning it into a video or an infographic. You can also use popular images and videos from the past in current marketing materials.
With a little creativity, you can easily find ways to repurpose existing content. Not only will this help you save time and money, but it will also allow you to deliver fresh, engaging content to the audience across your social commerce channels.
Please note that there is a difference between reusing and reposting. Reusing is great but reposting is not a great idea. Reposting is when you post the same information over and over again. But reusing is when you use an asset from one piece of content to enrich a different piece of content.
5. Get the Formats Right
With so many social networks to keep track of, it can be difficult to keep your assets organized and in the right format. Different social networks use different formats and quality settings, and many provide options for automatically converting, formatting and resizing rich media. However, most of these options can lead to slower upload times not forgetting less control. A better solution is to use a digital asset management (DAM) system like Catsy DAM.
With Catsy DAM, you can manage a single, high-quality version of an asset and generate derivatives as the demand dictates. This means that you can upload your assets once and then use them across all of your social networks, without worrying about format compatibility or file quality. In addition, Catsy DAM provides powerful tools for managing large collections of assets, making it the perfect solution for busy social media professionals.
DAM-Powered Self-Service Asset Portals
A good portion of social commerce success is enabled by social media ambassadors. With millions of followers, they have the ability to reach a vast audience and generate significant interest. However, in order for an influencer to be effective, they need to have the right digital assets to be able to amplify your products to their huge following. Manually choosing and sending these assets to influencers can be time-consuming and difficult to scale.
Instead of always having to keep choosing and sending them the right asset for each promotion, you can use DAM to automatically distribute digital assets such as product shots, videos, logos, reviews, and more as needed. This not only saves time, but also ensures that influencers always have the most up-to-date and relevant information about your products.
Catsy is Built for Social Success
Catsy PIM and DAM solutions are designed to help social commerce businesses succeed. With Catsy, you can easily share different versions of product data across different social media channels or distribute diverse digital assets. Catsy provides a central repository for all your product information and digital assets, making it easy for you to manage and update your content in any popular social media platform you might be using to promote and sell your products. In addition, Catsy’s powerful search engine makes it easy to find the right content quickly. With Catsy, you can be sure that your social commerce business will have the tools it needs to succeed. Book a free demo and witness Catsy in action.
Key Takeaways
In conclusion, social commerce is becoming increasingly important for businesses as more and more people spend their time on social media. Don’t be surprised if what we know now as eCommerce will evolve entirely and become social commerce – but time will tell! It offers impressive advantages over traditional e-commerce, including a larger potential customer base, the ability to build relationships with customers, and access to valuable customer data. As the era of social commerce continues to evolve, it’s likely that even more businesses will begin to take advantage of its many benefits.
Social commerce can be improved in many ways, including by leveraging the power of influencers. Influencers can help drive sales and set trends, often using their own personal experiences as examples and sharing them with a larger audience. User-generated content is also effective for engaging current customers and attracting new ones. Other areas to focus on include making the checkout process easier, introducing more payment options, increasing customer support services, and offering personalized shopping experiences.
User-generated content (UGC) is any creative material that originates from a group of users, rather than from professional creators such as marketing professionals and graphic designers. Examples of UGC can include photos, posts or reviews on social media, blog posts or comments on forums, ratings that customers can leave after completing a purchase with a retailer, and answers provided to questions in knowledge databases. Because it does not require businesses to put forth large amounts of capital for its creation, user-generated content has become an essential way for brands to build trust among their target audience.
Social commerce is a type of digital marketing strategy that combines the use of social media with eCommerce to increase sales. It focuses on creating an experience for customers that is both social and shopping related, by integrating features or services such as product reviews, user-generated content, exclusive offers, and direct notifications about new products and deals. These features are used to engage customers and persuade them to purchase products online.
To make a successful social commerce strategy, you need to focus on building relationships with leads and customers. This means creating content that helps them solve their problems, connecting via social media, and using strategies like email campaigns to stay in touch with them. You can also encourage your customers to leave reviews for your business and respond to their comments or concerns. Additionally, you should use advertising channels like Facebook, Instagram and Twitter to promote your products or services.
The six features of social commerce are: customer reviews, product recommendations, one-click sharing and commenting, purchase information sharing, live-streaming technology, and special promotions or discounts. These features make it easier for customers to find products they like and make a purchase. Additionally, they allow companies to get feedback from their customers directly as well as build rapport quickly.
Optimizing the buying process is crucial to improving customer experience. You can do this by streamlining checkout processes, making sure your product pages contain all relevant information and providing features like a wishlist or saved shopping carts. Additionally, make sure you provide fast shipping options and offer clear return policies. Keeping these things in mind can help improve customer satisfaction and enhance the overall buying experience.
Examples of social commerce include real-time offers and discounts, referrals, blog posts, customer reviews, product recommendations, advice and so on. Social networks like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram are all excellent platforms for implementing social commerce tools.
