YAN is an even bigger issue when combined with the fact that 88% of online buyers had at some point intentionally left registration information blank or used incorrect information when signing up for a new account, up 12% from 2010. Also, the expectation of consumers for brands to support Social Sign-On has increased significantly as eMarketer and Janrain recently reported that consumer desire for Social Sign-On has increased to 77% of US Online Buyers in 2011.

The importance of leveraging a single sign on authentication platform that is socially enabled becomes the key to unlocking a brands social CRM strategy. The reason for this is that Social Sign-On can lower the barrier of entry for a user, increase validity of data via the users social graph as well as increase stay rates.

According to recent research from Gigya, web users who log into 3rd party sites with Facebook’s Graph API spend 50% more time on those sites, and view twice as many pages. Think about the impact to a Fortune 500 retailer with 50% increase in stay rates and how that may impact purchase frequency.

When it comes to selecting which service is ideal for your brand, Gigya also released information that shows that Facebook accounts for 61% of those social logins.

Where social sign on really gets interesting is when a brand leverages an OAuth solution, such as Facebook’s Graph API. Instead of depending on a user to input a few sets of pre-determined data, you potentially have access to 180 data points to associate with the user. This includes the ability to access data tied to their feed, friends, activities, interests, music, books, movies, television, likes, checkins and more based on the users privacy settings.

This increases the probability of accurate subscriber data as well as the ability to append your proprietary questions on the back-end of the authorization of the user. Users in this scenario are more likely to share information as they are not repeating the information process. This also means that for a brand, the ability to build a robust profile around an individual beyond the standard data points such as basic demographic data and purchase history becomes a reality.

One of the more progressive brands when it comes to Social Sign-On is Nike.

Nike offers multiple options for authentication.

When you choose to login via Facebook, look at the data that Nike gains access to in one session…

A possible user scenario is as follows. Nike is about to become the uniform provider for the NFL in the upcoming 2012 season. Imagine if Nike had the ability to quickly scan the profile data of those who have authenticated via social sign-on and find team & athlete related Likes, game Checkin’s from the last season (Timeline makes this even easier), team related status updates, etc… tied to the users NFL team & players of choice. They would be able to proactively target those users with highly targeted and relevant offerings around the upcoming seasons jerseys and other merchandise that the user would then be compelled to engage.

This solution combined with other integrated tactics would most likely net better results than engaging in a mass e-mail/traditional campaign. Moving forward, the brands that understand how to leverage the immense amounts of data that individuals are providing via their social graph and then create relevant & highly targeted outreach campaigns will be the brands that will capitalize on socially enabled commerce.

As e-marketer shows below, in 2012 $3 billion in goods will be sold via social media this number jumps to $14 billion by 2015.

The key to this trend is not just positioning products via social channels, but lowering the barrier of entry, mapping CRM & social graph elements as well as highly targeted, relevant and timely offers via social & traditional channels.

The brands that understand how to better integrate their CRM programs with Social Graph data to create robust user profiles that are then the basis for executing their marketing strategy will be the winners.

It should be noted that integration of SSO is a cross departmental effort and this is one of the primary reasons more fortune 500 organizations have not adopted this method. It will take visionary executives who understand the value of data integration to push SSO forward.
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The Green Bay Packers’ 31-25 victory over the Pittsburgh Steelers in Texas drew a U.S. TV audience of 111 million, topping the 2010 final tally by almost 5 million, according to data released on Monday by broadcaster Fox.

“The airing of Super Bowl XLV goes down as Fox’s most-watched night of prime time ever, as well as Fox’s highest-rated night ever among Adults 18-49. It’s also the most-watched night on any network in at least 20 years,” Fox said in a statement.

Last year, 106.5 million watched the New Orleans Saints beat the Indianapolis Colts, surpassing the 106 million who tuned in for the finale of the comedy “M*A*S*H” in 1983.

The Super Bowl in 2009 drew 98.7 million viewers, and the audience in 2008 was 97.5 million.

And it didn’t stop with game day. Over 31 Million people have watched little Darth Vader use his powers to start a Volkswagen on YouTube, and 30 other advertisers actually premiered their much anticipated commercials online in advance of the Super Bowl.

Some other corresponding and interesting stats include:

• Harris Interactive Study. 25% of women exclusively watch for commercials. 12% of men.
• Per Clearspring: Posts mentioning Pepsi Max increased by 3,000% followed by Super 8, and Carmax. Chrysler also experienced a 1300% increase in searches for the brand name followed by Pepsi Max at 950% and Chatter.com at 900%.
• VW’s the Force was the most talked about ad on Twitter. 1 million views in 24 hours before Super Bowl even aired. Increased FB fans to the VW page by 20,000.
• Bud Light spent 1.2 billion for Super Bowl naming rights + ad time (the biggest investment of any brand).

Yes $3 Million is a fortune for a spot, but one could argue the reach extended via social media helps make that number a little more digestible.

I had a dinner with some friends last night and explained to them what LivingSocial/Groupon was all about.  (see that note below) Then today this too-good-to-be-true offer came in which just emphasized my point on why people love these companies.

Posted January 19th, 2011 at 12:56 pm by Gavin O’Malley

It looks like Groupon rival LivingSocial hit it big this week after offering members a $20 Amazon gift card for $10. “In just the first few hours of the sale, users have already purchased over 243,000 coupons,” reports ReadWriteWeb. How did LivingSocial land such a sweat deal? Well, as you may recall, Amazon invested $175 million into the startup in December. As such, Lightspeed Venture Partners’ Jeremy Lew calls this week’s deal “the first step of operational integration from that investment.” According to ReadWriteWeb, “Some are predicting the deal is on a course to outperform the previous blockbuster daily deal, when Groupon offered $25 off a $50 purchase at the Gap.” That resulted in some $13 million worth of coupons being sold. With nearly a day left to go, the LivingSocial deal had already sold over $2 million worth of coupons Wednesday morning. The final sales figure likely means little to Amazon, which is more interested in marketing the LivingSocial brand. Indeed, with Amazon’s help, it’s not hard to imagine LivingSocial achieving Groupon-like heights.

From: Larry Weintraub
Sent: Wednesday, January 19, 2011 12:01 PM
To: My Friends
Subject: FW: 50% Off Amazon.com Gift Card

Last night at dinner we had a conversation about Groupon / LivingSocial.  Today this came in from LivingSocial.  $20 gift card for $10 from Amazon.  No expiration date, limit one.

On a typical day and a typical deal, LivingSocial or Groupon will get anywhere form 300 – 3,000 people to buy one of these offers.  Today’s offer from LivingSocial is already over 650,000 and will probably hit 1 million today.  So, if you wonder why Google was prepared to pay nearly $6 Billion for Groupon (which they declined and I bet we see a similar offer coming soon for LivingSocial), now you know why.  They will do $20 Million in business today alone.  Doesn’t mean they are profitable, just gives you an idea of how big these things are.

By the way, I recommend you sign up to LivingSocial today and get this deal.  It only lasts til the end of the day and then it’s gone.  You can unsubscribe after that if you don’t want to get emails every day from them.  But hek, it’s $10 free to spend at Amazon.

Larry

Online Shopping on the Rise
First, sales are up.  Internet sales surged this year, and online retailers saw a 15.9% increase in sales from Black Friday 2009 to Black Friday 2010. The average price of online orders jumped 12% from 2009, and the first 26 days of November saw an increase of up to 13%. (Read more)

Foursquare Check-In’s and Black Friday Sales
While Foursqure users only represent a small portion of those who visited stores on Black Friday, many retailers used the service to offer deals for users who checked-in on their mobile phones. In a recent AdAge article, they revealed the most-checked-in retail stores on Foursqaure, citing that despite large promotional campaigns by companies like Sports Authority, the retailers that really shined when it came to check-ins were companies such as Walmart, Best Buy, and Target with the latter having almost one quarter of all Black Friday check-ins.

Cyber Monday Breaks a Record
Online sales for Cyber Monday reached a record high and surpassed $1 billion for the first time in history, according to ComScore. It is estimated that online shoppers spent roughly 16% more than last year on the same day. With more money invested into online promotions, and more advertising spent on social platforms, Cyber Monday saw 4% (9 million) more online shoppers spending roughly 10% more then last year based on (data compiled by Mashable).

Accounting and consulting firm, Deloitte, reports in its 25^th Annual Holiday Survey that, 72% of respondents said they would utilize the internet this holiday shopping season and 17% of them would use their smartphones in the process. An additional 12% said they would use social media sites such as Facebook to aid them in their purchasing decisions. Of those consumers that said they would utilize social media sites, the reasons they gave included: gift ideas, coupons, discounts and promotional information; which should prove very useful to retailers as the clock ticks closer to Black Friday.

Web analytics firm, Coremetrics, found that social media will be among the top five most effective ways to attract new visitors to stores and websites. “The thing that is really interesting is that the second best channel for getting new visitors has turned out to be Facebook,” says John Squire, Coremetrics’ chief strategy officer.  The result, retailers should see more people in their stores, both brick and mortar and online, and consumers are primed to save a tremendous amount of time and money.

Who is Doing What?

Retailers are already jumping on the geo-location bandwagon and using notable platforms such as Foursquare and Facebook Places to drive people into stores.  Facebook is opening up its 500 Million-plus subscriber base to retailers in the hopes of taking on the geo-location industry leader, Foursquare. Merchants like Starbucks, McDonalds, and H&M have already created promotions, and earlier this month The Gap used Facebook Places to give away 10,000 pairs of jeans across 900 of their participating US stores.

JCPenney is no stranger to online promotions and boasts nearly 1.2 million Facebook fans.  The company is wrapping a Black Friday sweepstakes that offers 15 lucky Facebook fans a shopping spree where JCPenney shopping experts will be their personal escorts. The company has also partnered with The Salvation Army for a holiday season-long Angel Giving Tree campaign that helps children and seniors in need. Additionally, rather than let shoppers leave Facebook, they have integrated an online shopping experience directly into their Facebook page.

Lowes, the home improvement retailer, launched a Black Friday campaign called “Lowe’s Black Friday Sneak Peek Party on Facebook”.  Fans RSVP’d to the event by Friday, November 5^th which gave them early access to tremendous deals.  Customers were given coupon codes of up to 90% off products on their website. The event was so popular that Lowe’s actually extended the event from Friday through the entire weekend.

Kmart is using Facebook and Twitter to promote their extended Black Friday sales and a Christmas trip sweepstakes while Urban Outfitters and Levi’s have integrated the Facebook “Like” button into their online stores, allowing customers to sort products based on the ones “Liked” most frequently – making it real easy for you to buy for someone who loves those brands.

Social shopping is also playing a much larger role this year than in years past. Sites like LivingSocial and Groupon offer great daily deals to subscribers and the latter has branched out to working with national chains like The Gap and The Body Shop.

The Gap recently offered $50 gift cards at half price through Groupon while The Body Shop offered $40 worth of merchandise for $20. Many thousands of customers participated in these Groupon deals and we expect to see many more retailers participating in similar offerings as we get closer to the holidays. LivingSocial plans on launching a promotion called the 12 Days of Gifting, a program that will offer 12 days of giftable deals, ranging from fine dining to retail stores.

This season, both the retailer and the consumer are benefiting greatly from technology.  As a retailer, the opportunity to drive people into your stores has never been better.  As a consumer the chance to save money, time and aggravation is equally as exciting. Hopefully the end result of your social shopping experience will make you, well… more social!

The focus of this white paper is the long-term business value of a social relationship. In this we also introduce our Social Relationship Value (SRV™) formula for calculating this monetary value. This formula focuses specifically on factors within each individual business, providing a measurement that is appropriate and commensurate with the goals, needs, and values of that particular organization.

Check it out and let us know what you think.

For additional information, visit www.Fanscape.com

MTVN Touts Shorter Web Video Ads

July 16, 2009

- Mike Shields

NEW YORK MTV Networks believes it has found a better answer for short-form online video advertising than the derided 30-second pre-roll: very short video spots (five seconds long) accompanied by corresponding but slightly delayed display ads.

The company this week disclosed the results of an elaborate study on online video advertising called Project Inform. That effort sought to find a better ad standard for the burgeoning medium, preferably one that combined brand effectiveness with user tolerance.

MTVN started with over 20 ad unit possibilities. By early 2009, it had boiled down its list of potential ad formats to three, including the classic pre-roll. Another unit was called the Lower 1/3 Product Suite, which combines five-second pre-rolls with transparent Flash ads that take over the bottom third of users’ video screens only after 10 seconds of content has streamed. The other unit was dubbed the Sideloader Product Suite, which also utilizes five-second spots and delayed animated display ads appearing at the side of the video player.

From January through April of this year, MTVN began testing the three placements on its collection of sites, including MTV.com, ComedyCentral.com and CMT.com. The test used 50 million streams of ad inventory for three different advertisers, including a movie studio, a packaged-goods provider and a grocery brand. The results indicated that while pre-rolls performed fairly well, the Lower 1/3 scored best when it came to classic metrics like unaided awareness, aided awareness and purchase intent.

Why do people like the Lower 1/3 unit?  It’s hard to say definitively, but Stirratt theorized that it has something to do with the lag between the short five-second pre-roll and the display unit, which appears 10 seconds later. Using that setup, “You already have a favorable impression of a brand, and people are really engrossed in content. And they are still able to interact if they want,” she said.

“Obviously, we need agencies and clients on board [creating original online video ads],” Stirratt said. “The win for the industry is when people start creating things for this medium instead of for other media.”

<Read the whole article here>

Industry News via DM News….

Interactive marketing will hit $55 billion and represent 21% of all marketing spending by 2014, as marketers continue to shift dollars from away from traditional media and toward search marketing, display advertising, e-mail marketing, social media and mobile marketing, according to Forrester Research.

In the US Interactive Marketing Forecast, 2009 to 2014, released July 8, Forrester found that marketers faced with budget cuts and the need for immediate sales in recessionary times turn towards interactive tools that are less expensive, more measurable, and better for direct response than traditional media.

“In today’s economic climate, marketers are shifting dollars downstream, so they are much more focused on tools that drive immediate response and sales,” said report author Shar VanBoskirk, VP and principal analyst at
Forrester.

Sixty percent of marketers surveyed indicated they would increase budget for interactive by shifting money away from traditional marketing. Unfortunately for direct marketers, the direct mail budget was cited more than any other traditional medium as the place to cut.

To read the rest of the article click here