Social commerce: What's possible, and what's actually happening

Tags: Multichannel Retailing, Online Retailing, Social Media

Type: White Paper

Imagine a fictional online apparel store targeting teenage girls, called TeenFashion.com. Prom season is approaching, and the retailer naturally wants to attract the attention of young girls looking for that perfect dress. Experts in merchandising line up a special photo shoot, showcasing the dresses in all their glory. The site designer creates a visually interesting layout for special prom pages, giving girls a way to view the store’s entire inventory of dresses, shoes and accessories. The company employs a multi-faceted promotional campaign, offering free earrings with the purchase of a dress. All good.

Now imagine a competitor with a slightly different approach. This time we’ll use a real case study of Sears.com. Its Prom Premier 2008 campaign involved the launch of a Prom Premiere website that allowed girls to share photos of dresses with family and friends via email and Facebook.

The site offered an interactive "red carpet" experience, greeting visitors with music and virtual photographers. Visitors could click through the online gallery of dresses, then share the styles online with their Facebook friends or via email. The site also offered one-click links to shoes, purses and other accessories from Sears.com to complete the prom-night ensemble.

While our fictional company relied on a traditional topdown, retailer-to-consumer approach, Sears.com encouraged and enabled interaction among its customers. Sears identified a time-honored social custom for girls shopping for prom dresses – bringing friends along for their opinions – and introduced that social element into the online shopping experience, both on its own website and within the popular social networking site Facebook.