Social Times.com: The Science Of Sharing: What Influences The Social Consumer

Its worth noting the significance of vertical sites on the road to purchase, especially regarding higher consideration purchases (home theater, cars, vacations etc) Likewise search continues to drive purchase influence over social networking- if your in market or near market then Facebook & Twitter are not the most efficient way to build a consideration set as netizens are not on them looking for shopping tips – sure some folks love to ask their online friends for hotel and restaurant recommendations for an overseas trip, but much else. Social is still top of the funnel and has value, especially in reputation management.

Cheers,

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Today’s consumers are more social than ever.  They follow their favorite brands on Twitter, look for product recommendations from friends on Facebook, search ratings and reviews online and share their own experiences with brands across their social networks.

Beyond decided to take a look at what makes the social consumer tick and they released their results in a series of infographics called ‘The Science Of Sharing.’ Joann DeLanoy of Beyond explains, “To better understand social consumers, we asked 1,500 participants about the products and services they had most recently researched online and how they went about it.  We found that depending on the product or service, a channel may have more or less influence on a social consumer’s decision to purchase.”

The first infographic in the series, ‘An Inside Look At The Social Consumer,’ was released in October.  The infographic was designed to introduce the social consumer and explored how today’s social consumer is using social media.  53 percent of consumers use Facebook to interact with brands; 40 percent have liked a product on Facebook; and 20 percent use Facebook to research products at least once a week.  The first installment explored influential online social channels, actions taken after online interaction and more, leading to the conclusion that, “All digital channels play a role in a brand’s marketing strategy; looking at the channel your social consumer is most influenced by will lead to an increase in your digital return on investment.”

Part two of the series was released earlier this week and explores the top influential online channels, as well as a deeper analysis of the social consumer.  Check out both infographics in the Science of Sharing series below and let us know what you think.  How do you engage with social media when looking to purchase or get recommendations about products?

Infographics via Beyond