Social Selling: Why it is time and how to get started
Posted by Daniel Newman in Social Media
Each passing year there is more content, more data and more social influence on not only what we buy, but also the way we buy it. For brands seeking to stay ahead of the trends, social selling isn’t so much an option, but a core strategy for building your brand and staying in front of the buyer that isn’t reaching out and asking for help; a group we sometimes call the invisible buyer, but nonetheless a group that may very well represent the majority of consumers.
http://www.reachingnewprospects.com/
Back in 2011 Google released a study called “Zero Moment of Truth.” The purpose of the study was to better understand the informed consumer who was able to create buy/sell parity by using the vast resources of the web when making their buying decisions.
The results were overwhelmingly supportive of the idea that the Internet is changing the buyer’s journey. The primary drivers of this change was the amount of content that companies were creating that allowed buyers to become informed without the direct involvement of a vendor.
For those less familiar with the Zero Moment, here are a few of the highlights of the 2011 study.
- On average shoppers engaged with 10.4 unique pieces of online content during the buyer’s journey
- 50% of shoppers used a search engine to get more information on a product or brand
- 38% did comparison shopping online
- 36% checked the brand/manufacturer’s website
- 31% read online endorsements, reviews or recommendations.
Now this was nearly 5 years ago. Fast forward to today and all of these trends have become more pronounced as our internet usage is on the rise and the amount of data being created is doubling every two years. (The term “Big Data” may ring a bell?)