In a tough economy, more retailers are turning to social media as an attempt to reach their target audience. With a shaky economy expected to impact the amount of money consumers spend on back-to-school shopping, retailers are using social media to capture the attention of younger consumers, drive brand recognition, and develop market awareness. But one UK social networking company has, according to John Hicks of Headline Promotions Press & Public Relations, come up with a novel idea to capture our imagination as parents.
At this time of year, clients in the consumer market often ask about how they take advantage of the return to school trade. I am particularly interested in the use of social networking sites to help them do this.
Jupiter Research, a leading authority on the impact of the Internet and emerging consumer technologies on business, has found that an increasing number of retailers are using social media to target teens and young adults during the 2008 back-to-school shopping season.
As a result, social media has emerged as an important marketing platform as many retailers use the popularity of social networking sites like Facebook to carry-out their marketing campaigns.
“The back-to-school season has grown in importance for retailers and leads into the all important fourth quarter sales period,” explained Patti Freeman Evans, Research Director and Online Retail Analyst at JupiterResearch. “With the shaky economy expected to impact the amount of money consumers spend on back-to-school shopping, retailers are using social media to capture the attention of younger consumers.”
Retailers are experimenting with a variety of Web 2.0 technologies to host their back-to-school marketing campaigns, including the use of virtual worlds, social networks, social shopping sites, visual search engines, interactive video content, and widgets.
To promote its two new clothing lines, department store J.C.Penney created an online game called "DorkDodge" in which a girl has to navigate through a number of undesirable boyfriends to find her dream date. The retailer also launched an integrated marketing campaign showing teens how they can “get that look” with an array of clothing brands sold at J.C.Penney stores, featuring the theme of “The Breakfast Club.”
A similar campaign by Sears features actress Vanessa Hudgens, from the TV movie sensation “High School Musical”, playing characters who represent different styles that can be recreated from clothing sold by Sears.
Retailers like Apple also value relationships with universities as college-aged consumers are a key demographic. As part of Apple’s US back-to-school promotion, students and faculty of an accredited university receive a free iPod with the purchase of a computer.
According to David Schatsky, President of JupiterResearch, “Retailers experimenting with Web 2.0 experiences will largely find benefit from them in the form of branding and awareness building rather than direct sales as social media has shown little direct impact on actual online retail sales.”
But for those of us who are also parents as well as marketers, the impending return to school brings the opportunity to capture some images we can share with others and keep for a lifetime. But how?
Do you grab the digital camera? The camcorder? Extra memory cards? Batteries? It’s dizzying the number of choices you have. And then what if you want to share those precious moments with grandparents, aunts, uncles and friends? You’ve got to spend all that time uploading or sending individual pictures and videos. After all is said and done, we’re talking at least a couple hours of time, and probably more.
I have come across a unique offering from a UK company. Next2Friends has a simple solution to all these problems. All you need is a compatible mobile phone. Gone are the days of storing a bunch of photos on a camera. You can snap and upload photos of your beaming child to the web for anyone to see instantly using Next2Friends Snap Up.
And gone are the days of transferring video to your computer for hours. You can stream live video of those first cautious steps onto the school bus directly to the web using your mobile phone, viewable by others in real time, with Next2Friends Live.
And the best part is that you can share those photos and videos so easily by either directing people to your profile or generating a recommendation email with a link. So go ahead, give it a try! All you stand to lose is a few cameras and camcorders!
Next2Friends brings together a range of great mobile services under one banner. Whether it’s live video streaming from mobile to web, finding people with similar interests while out and about, or snapping pictures to share with those who couldn’t make an event, Next2Friends helps people share real life, as it’s happening, and in all its glory. Backed up by a full social networking service online, Next2Friends is the easiest way to get connected to interesting people, places, parties and content around the globe. You can find them at http://www.next2friends.com/
I have started by creating a corporate page on the Next2Friends website: http://www.next2friends.com/users/headline. I haven’t yet fully worked out the full potential of this commercial opportunity to expand further into social networking but I reckon it’s going to be fun anyway!
As they say, “watch this space”.
As a result, social media has emerged as an important marketing platform as many retailers use the popularity of social networking sites like Facebook to carry-out their marketing campaigns.
“The back-to-school season has grown in importance for retailers and leads into the all important fourth quarter sales period,” explained Patti Freeman Evans, Research Director and Online Retail Analyst at JupiterResearch. “With the shaky economy expected to impact the amount of money consumers spend on back-to-school shopping, retailers are using social media to capture the attention of younger consumers.”
Retailers are experimenting with a variety of Web 2.0 technologies to host their back-to-school marketing campaigns, including the use of virtual worlds, social networks, social shopping sites, visual search engines, interactive video content, and widgets.
To promote its two new clothing lines, department store J.C.Penney created an online game called "DorkDodge" in which a girl has to navigate through a number of undesirable boyfriends to find her dream date. The retailer also launched an integrated marketing campaign showing teens how they can “get that look” with an array of clothing brands sold at J.C.Penney stores, featuring the theme of “The Breakfast Club.”
A similar campaign by Sears features actress Vanessa Hudgens, from the TV movie sensation “High School Musical”, playing characters who represent different styles that can be recreated from clothing sold by Sears.
Retailers like Apple also value relationships with universities as college-aged consumers are a key demographic. As part of Apple’s US back-to-school promotion, students and faculty of an accredited university receive a free iPod with the purchase of a computer.
According to David Schatsky, President of JupiterResearch, “Retailers experimenting with Web 2.0 experiences will largely find benefit from them in the form of branding and awareness building rather than direct sales as social media has shown little direct impact on actual online retail sales.”
But for those of us who are also parents as well as marketers, the impending return to school brings the opportunity to capture some images we can share with others and keep for a lifetime. But how?
Do you grab the digital camera? The camcorder? Extra memory cards? Batteries? It’s dizzying the number of choices you have. And then what if you want to share those precious moments with grandparents, aunts, uncles and friends? You’ve got to spend all that time uploading or sending individual pictures and videos. After all is said and done, we’re talking at least a couple hours of time, and probably more.
I have come across a unique offering from a UK company. Next2Friends has a simple solution to all these problems. All you need is a compatible mobile phone. Gone are the days of storing a bunch of photos on a camera. You can snap and upload photos of your beaming child to the web for anyone to see instantly using Next2Friends Snap Up.
And gone are the days of transferring video to your computer for hours. You can stream live video of those first cautious steps onto the school bus directly to the web using your mobile phone, viewable by others in real time, with Next2Friends Live.
And the best part is that you can share those photos and videos so easily by either directing people to your profile or generating a recommendation email with a link. So go ahead, give it a try! All you stand to lose is a few cameras and camcorders!
Next2Friends brings together a range of great mobile services under one banner. Whether it’s live video streaming from mobile to web, finding people with similar interests while out and about, or snapping pictures to share with those who couldn’t make an event, Next2Friends helps people share real life, as it’s happening, and in all its glory. Backed up by a full social networking service online, Next2Friends is the easiest way to get connected to interesting people, places, parties and content around the globe. You can find them at http://www.next2friends.com/
I have started by creating a corporate page on the Next2Friends website: http://www.next2friends.com/users/headline. I haven’t yet fully worked out the full potential of this commercial opportunity to expand further into social networking but I reckon it’s going to be fun anyway!
As they say, “watch this space”.
