dotbox: The 4Cs of Social Commerce - The 4C-able Future - Ashley Heather

Welcome dotbox our newest MediaBizBloggerThis is the introduction to our four part series quotThe 4Cs of Social Commercequot which will cover each Commerce Content Community and Context in greater detail Please come back weekly to read upcoming installmentsMore than Just FacebookIncreasingly the term quotSocial Commercequot is coming into vogue However many of those waving the flag are industry professionals who narrow the definition to lend credence to their own specialtyamp8212often nothing more than building Facebook Stores This is misleading Social Commerce is so much more than just fcommerceIt Is that BigSocial Commerce encompasses a whole array of strategies tactics and technologies that thoroughly enmesh Commerce with quotThe Socialquot It goes without saying that the two have always been inextricably linked However recent innovations in the digital space are giving brands retailers and consumers too a far greater degree of control of how it all unfolds Ultimately what is taking place here is a seachange in how we do businessThe 4CsIn particular there are four overlapping arenas that concern usamp8212we call them Commerce Content Community and Contextamp8212ie The 4Cs of Social Commerce Together they constitute the very essence of Social Commerce isamp8212which is the next generation of digital commerce and its latest chapterIt39s ShoppingAt the end of the day we retailers brands and their agents are here in this space to drive sales Digital commerce is at the heart of everything we do All that comes after is a flowering of this essential core activityamp8212Shoppingamp8230 But in retrospect since the crude beginnings of ecommerce how far we have comeGonna Have an EvolutionWe see the 4Cs as natural progressive evolutions of ecommerce since it emerged in the 1980s Happily each has been digitally mastered in succession at intervals of perhaps 3amp82115 years magnifying in sum the overall vibrancy and power of all those that have come before Social Commerce is just now beginning to reach the critical point of its powerful potential It39s been around for a few years at least but is only now starting to be understood in sharp focusThe 4Cable FutureYou39ve heard of the 4Cs of buying a diamond but we39re betting that the way we use the terms to define Social Commerce may be new to many of you Here they are below in brief1 Commerce ca 1998Early on it was all just a matter of getting your inventory up online and working out a streamlined purchase path and checkout processamp8212the fewer the clicks the better It was really on the fulfillment end that things got sticky Not surprisingly for many large retailers ecommerce was run as a small division of the mailorder catalogue business That39s essentially what it was in electronic form2 Content ca 2003The Web revolution has removed all limits to the amount of depth a brand can provide its customers Pictures video information and editorial can all help to make a website a destination for those researching a purchase increasing engagement time and helping to build strong brand affinity If the content is good sales naturally follow3 Community ca 2007Suddenly after the advent of Facebook brands didn39t just have customers who bought things they had communities who shared their excitement with each other and also virally with still others Many businesses immediately saw this as the beginning of a 2way conversation with customersamp8212they wanted to show them they were listening Others saw it as a 3way conversation between them their fans and their fans39 friends What it all meant was that your messaging suddenly had viral organic reach On one level this was a very costeffective way to keep sites lively and informative But it soon occurred to the more progressive among us that it is ultimately worth a whole lot more to empower customers to take an emotional stake in the brand to get involved at every levelamp8212and push it forward4 Context ca 2010Last but not least it is Context that most effectively cuts through the clutter to make brands their collections and individual products and experiences resonate most with consumers In essence what it means is personalizing websites and other digital experiences to deliver content according to relevance There39s so much information available The trick is to boil up the good stuff to the top There39s quotThe Whoquot to it prioritizing the products content and offers you deliver your customers by social relevance think degrees of separation And then there39s quotThe Wherequotamp8212geolocation is one aspect but how exactly you are there is also important For this reason we all need to think in terms of delivering a consistent experience in allchannel commerce web socnet mobile tablet instore etcConclusionTo some unfamiliar with the nextgeneration digital marketplace one or several of the 4Cs may now seem like passing fads extraneous to their bottom line dotbox is here to offer a different point of view In this day and age and evermore businesses ignore any of quotThe 4Cs of Social Commercequot only at their own perilNext StepsWill your business grow with the future or get left behind How well you integrate all 4Cs togetherasone will likely be among the most important deciding factors in your ongoing success Call us Let39s talkThis is the introduction to our four part series quotThe 4Cs of Social Commercequot which will cover each Commerce Content Community and Context in greater detail Please come back weekly to read upcoming installmentsdotbox CEO Ashley Heather is one of the pioneers at the intersection of ecommerce social interaction and locationaware services His companies include Musikube and Entertainment Media Works which brought us StarStyle StyleLogue and Plinkingamp8212in 2004 among the first Social Commerce websites In his native London he was the lead digital consultant at Impact Plus and an executive at Ford Motor Company He is a frequent speaker at media industry events including iBreakfast CTIA Wireless The Digital Coast Roundtable MoMeMo Social Media Week and is an Associate Member of IADAS He can be reached at ashleydotboxcomRead all Ashley39s MediaBizBloggers commentaries at dotboxCheck us out on Facebook at MediaBizBloggerscomFollow our Twitter updates MediaBizBloggerMediaBizBloggers is an openthought leadership blog platform for media marketing and advertising professionals companies and organizations To contribute contact Jackmediadvisorygroupcom The opinions expressed in MediaBizBloggerscom are not those of Media Advisory Group its employees or other MediaBizBloggerscom contributors Media Advisory Group accepts no responsibility for the views of MediaBizBloggers authors

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