14 Dec, 2011

Holiday Wish Lists: Putting Social Into Your Secret Santa Shopping Trip

Posted by Brianna Littlepage | Categories: Social CRM | Tags: Facebook Fan Engagement

It’s that time of the year when people get serious about shopping, looking for the hot deals, researching products and paying close attention to reviews. Much of this is done online, so in some ways it is not surprising that 57% of online consumers report talking more to their friends online than offline, with 9 out of 10 placing trust in peer recommendations. With so much importance placed on these online references, its time for retailers to start thinking about how to bring that social shopping experience in-store. There’s got to be a way to shift social commerce from online-only experience, to a fully integrated in-store experience. But how? 

It got me thinking about a teammate who went to the F8 conference earlier this fall. She came back raving about the way that Facebook deployed RFID technology to create an entirely social conference – with everything from the conference playlist to the digital billboards driven by the audience’s Facebook profile. All of it was powered by individual attendees connecting with the show at kiosks using their RFID powered conference badges. So, if that can happen at a conference, why not apply that same sort of experience to a retail environment?  Imagine the possibilities – especially at the holidays!.

Wouldn’t it be great to experience this next week when you go visit those elves at Target? Imagine this scenario:

Walk into Target, simply scan your loyalty card (which you’ve already linked to your Facebook account) at one of 4 centralized social-spots to see your friends’ wish list for the season.   With a simple click you send the wish list to your phone - making your holiday shopping experience that much more social!

Creating this scenario takes a little bit of preparation, but all could be possible one day with the right technology!

  • First, retailers need to socialize their site experience.
    • Integrate the new breed of open graph plugins (wish, love, want, etc.) on site to allow consumers to indicate what items they want on their wish list. So if your friends are crazy about that fantastic owl wall clock at Target, they can tell people with a simple click!
  • Secondly, loyalty accounts need to be linked to users Facebook accounts, and the cards need to be updated to work with RFID readers:
    • Incorporate RFID tags in their loyalty cards, so that shoppers can scan these cards at RFID readers to pull up unique data.
    • Shoppers set up loyalty cards to connect to their Facebook accounts.
  • Lastly, RFID readers need to be updated in most stores.
    • Set up 4-6 RFID readers and screens in the store so shoppers can pull up their friends wish list!

If you think the consumer implications to this are cool, just think about the targeted marketing opportunities this type of integration will lead to:

  • Retailers can follow up with targeted emails to friends regarding their wish list items
  • Individual brands could introduce their own RFID readers as end of aisle displays. When shoppers scan their cards, they could “checkin” and create a story on their Facebook page, just like they did at F8 this year. 
  • With advance shopping cart technology from SK Telecom, shoppers could potentially scan their loyalty cards with their RFID enabled shopping carts to bring up friends wish list items based on their position in the store!