Facebook Offers Helps Businesses Leverage Social Mobile Local

On May 3rd, Facebook officially rolled out its new Groupon-like marketing platform, Facebook Offers, to all local U.S. companies. With Offers, businesses can distribute coupons or other promotions to fans directly through news their news feeds. Two things make this a potential boon for your brand:  1) Facebook isn’t charging anything or taking a cut, and 2) when a Facebook user claims your Offer, his or her friends will see an ad in their news feed; the action also posts to the user’s Timeline.

So not only can you keep 100% of the proceeds from an offer, but every time one of your fans purchases, you’re broadcasting the offer to that person’s entire following.

Talk about reach.

What’s in it for Facebook? Ad revenue, of course. The social network is hoping you’ll get enough free business from Offers that you’ll pony up cash to purchase Facebook ads to increase your fan-base and potential coupon subscriber base. If it works, Offers could be a win-win for both the social network and your business.

Admittedly, the new Offers product is most relevant for brands trying to draw bodies into a bricks-and-mortar storefront. But for companies who fit the bill, Offers represents the perfect combination of social, mobile and local.

For example, imagine a smartphone user hanging out at a local coffee shop sipping a latte and logging into Facebook (with roughly 50% of FB users accessing the site via mobile each month, this is not too far-fetched). Browsing their newsfeed, the user notices a coupon offer from a local business they follow. Intrigued, the user clicks on the “Get Offer” button, which sends it to the primary email address associated with his or her Facebook account. To redeem, the user can either present a printed copy of the offer to the merchant, or show the offer from their mobile phone.

When a user obtains an offer, a story about it is automatically added to the user’s timeline, which by default is visible to the user’s friends. Users can also share offers with whomever they choose by clicking the “share offer” link beneath the story.

Pretty handy.

On paper, Facebook Offers seems like a brilliant integration of social, mobile and local, providing brands an easy way to generate more business and broaden their social reach, all in real time. We’ll have to see how many businesses will actually experiment with Offers, and to what extent users will integrate the service into their daily lives.

If you decide to try out Offers, make sure your staff is fully briefed regarding all aspects of each promotion. Just remember that deriving business from a massive social media site structured to promote social sharing can be a double-edged sword for your brand. Get it right, and you’ll likely broaden your online reach and enjoy an immediate uptick in sales; get it wrong, and you may do serious damage to your online reputation at a point in history when such a thing is an increasingly valuable commodity.

Is your business planning on using Facebook Offers? If not, what's holding you back?

¹ Search Engine Watch, “Facebook Offers Rolls Out to Local US Businesses”

Image Courtesy of MJA Impressions

 

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The Busy, BUSY Executive’s Guide to Winning with Mobile

The introduction to Google’s new mobile-focused content piece, The Busy Executive's Guide for Winning with Mobile, (AKA the Mobile Playbook) begins with the header “Mobile Changes Everything,” and ends with this line: “At Google, we believe that your success in mobile will determine the future of your business.”

How’s that for direct?

Never mind that Google stands to make a lot of money in mobile ad revenue, or that Google’s Android is one of the most-widely used mobile platforms on earth. It’s become almost a given that anything Google puts out will have an element of self-promotion (And why not? This is a capitalist economy, after all).

Setting this fact aside, it is usually a really good idea to pay attention to anything Google has to say, especially if the tech giant goes the length of creating a content piece to elaborate on it.

BOOK REPORT

Recognizing that many business executives don’t have enough time in the day to sift through a full-length content piece, I’ve created this abridged “book report” on Google’s Mobile Playbook, or as I call it, “The busy BUSY Executive’s Guide for Winning with Mobile.”

Let’s Begin…

***5 Crucial Mobile Questions every business executive should be asking today:

I. How Does Mobile Change Our Value Proposition?

Consumers can now use smart-phones and tablets to interact with businesses 24/7, from anywhere-at home, at work, on a bus. It’s critical that your business define its value proposition through a mobile lens by determining exactly how your target audience wants to engage with your brand on mobile.

Think Local-Mobile: 95% of mobile users have searched for local info61% called a business after searching59% visited in person90% of these users acted within 24 hoursIn-Store Experience: a new era of price transparency 45% of consumers use smartphones for in-store product research and browsing53% of men use smartphones in-store to check prices out at other stores, whereas only 38% of women do the same39% of walk-outs (customers leaving without buying) were influenced by smartphone usage

What can your business do?

Improve the in-store experience (expert service, encourage same-day pickup of big ticket items)Create and stock unique products (makes apples-to-apples comparison irrelevant)Embrace mobile usage within your store Offer free wifi…drive mobile users to website to place orders; select in-store pickupIntegrate QR codes with in-store products offering important info (silent salespeople)   

II. How Does Mobile Impact our Digital Destinations?

“Your #1 priority is to create a mobile website”

In the Playbook, Google really emphasizes the importance of having a mobile-optimized website to engage mobile customers.

57% of users say they won’t recommend a business with a poorly-designed mobile site40% have turned to a competitor’s site after a bad mobile experience

A mobile-optimized website makes it easier for prospects and customers to connect with you via their smartphones and tablets. As an example of this, Google highlights 1-800-Flowers.com, an e-retailer that became one of the first to jump into mobile six years ago with an optimized website and apps across multiple mobile platforms:

1-800 Flowers.com worked with mobile vendor Moovweb to launch an enhanced smartphone-optimized site whose key features include “ Find a Gift Fast,” which connects shoppers with local flower arrangements, deep linking functionality to ensure that searches land on the mobile site, and an enhanced calendar to help users figure out shipping and other costs. What was the impact? Increased conversions, and time spent on-site up 25% from the original mobile site.

As a complement to a mobile-optimized site, mobile apps can make it easy for your customers to interact with your brand. As cited in the Playbook, 91% of companies featured in Interbrand’s 2011 Best Global Brands have a presence in at least one of the major app stores - a figure that’s up 51% from 18 months ago.

In order to be effective, mobile apps should offer users value, either by way of entertainment, utility, or both. Before embarking upon a mobile app project, make sure you have a clear reason for building it (i.e. to engender loyalty, introduce new functionality, etc).

Once you’ve developed the next killer app, you need to promote it through your best marketing channels.

Provide mobile site links on your website, social media, email campaigns, online newslettersUse mobile search ads to direct users to your app in the app marketplace

III. Is Our Organization Adapting to Mobile?

This section of the Playbook offers up some detailed questions you can ask on an organizational level regarding your company’s adaptation (or lack thereof) to mobile. The key takeaway here is the idea of assigning a “mobile champion” in your company, and empowering that person with a “cross-functional” task force to implement mobile-friendly practice wherever relevant. Apparently Google chairman Eric Schmidt has a “Mobile First” principle, whereupon he calls on every team, from ads to maps to Doubleclick to YouTube, to include mobile in their product and business plans.

This mobile task force should work to benchmark the mobile efforts of your competition, set a mobile budget, and try to understand how your customers use mobile by implementing focus groups and surveys.

IV. How Should Our Marketing Adapt to Mobile?

The Playbook goes on to detail exactly how your company’s marketing can adapt to mobile. As if to underscore the importance of mobile, Google points out that mobile search queries have grown 5X in the past two years.

When thinking about your brand’s approach to mobile marketing, you should focus on one overarching question:

What is the experience like for a consumer trying to find you and connect with you?

First, some general mobile marketing tips:

Try to separate mobile-specific ads from desktop search campaigns so you can accurately test, measure and develop messaging that works best in this new formatCreate geo-local specific ads based on how close the consumer is to your business, your competitors or relevant locations like airports and mallsLayer your search ads with location extensions; these are additional links that appear in the ad that show your business’s location and phone numberMake sure your mobile marketing aims align with your overall marketing aims

Then a specific question: Who do you want to reach?

How can you most effectively reach them?What actions do you want them to take?How can you measure these actions?Are you after broad reach or just buzz?

Finally, you need to examine your marketing initiatives through a mobile lens:

Email - Up to 30% of email opens come from mobile Think carefully about mobile layout (longer rather than wider)Review your calls-to-action and links to make sure they are mobile-optimizedSocial Media - Don’t just think social, think social mobile More than half of mobile social networkers access social content from their mobile deviceCoupons and Promotions - Whether you create a scan-able coupon or a code that can be keyed into the register, be sure to track mobile separately Add a QR code to print pieces to give your static ads mobile conversion power

V. How Can We Connect with our Tablet Audience?

“By 2014, 208 million tablets will be sold worldwide, and 72% of tablet owners make purchases from their devices on a weekly basis, making the audience very desirable.”

In this final section, the Playbook essentially regurgitates information already covered in the last section, reminding you to check out your tablet consumers’ experience with your brand, build unique tablet experiences, and tweak your search campaigns for tablet users.

One area Google does stress specifically for tablets is the use of rich interactive media such as HTML5 to show off products, which only makes sense given their larger screens.

Just as it started, Google’s Mobile Playbook ends in a flourish:

“At Google, we believe that mobile represents a sociological shift with how users relate with both the digital and physical world. Businesses that understand this will win.”

For whatever it is worth, I tend to agree with the gang from Mountain View on this one.

 

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Google, Facebook and Mobile Flush Groupon Down the Toilet

Online daily deal provider Groupon, once the darling of Wall Street, has had its share of woes in recent months. Its stock is down over 50% from November's IPO price, thanks in part to a pending SEC investigation of the company’s Q4 2011 earnings restatement (actual net revenue was significantly lower when refunds to consumers for unused deals were factored in). In addition, merchants are beginning to pull back from Groupon, surveying their options in an increasingly crowded geo-local marketing landscape that includes the likes of Yelp, Google, Facebook, Amazon, Living Social and Foursquare, to name a few.

In his yearly letter to shareholders released Monday, Groupon CEO Andrew Mason tried to rally the troops by announcing his vision to re-shape the company into a one-stop marketing solution for local merchants, or as he put it, “the operating system for local commerce.”

Unfortunately for Groupon, Mason’s vision does not mesh with reality. The truth is, the daily deals site has already seen its best days, and will soon be marginalized by its competitors, especially Google and Facebook, who are rolling out geo-local couponing programs that will suck the air out of Groupon’s market share.

MOBILE HASTENS THY DEMISE

As smartphone adoption continues to grow nationwide, nearly three-quarters of smartphone owners are accessing their mobile devices to get location-based information in real time. A new study conducted by the Pew Internet & American Life Project found that about 74% of smartphone users utilize location-based services to find information. In addition, one in five (18%) are checking in to local businesses with geo-social services like Foursquare.¹

Facebook and Google have responded in kind to this trend toward mobile-based local marketing.

On May 3rd, Facebook rolled out its new local marketing platform, Facebook Offers, to all local U.S. companies. With Offers, businesses can distribute coupons or other promotions to fans directly through their news feeds. Facebook isn’t charging anything for the service, and when a Facebook user claims an Offer, his or her friends will see it in their news feed, further amplifying its reach.

Less than a week later (May 9th), Google announced its latest update for Google Maps for Android that supports Google’s Groupon-like daily deal platform, Google Offers. With the new update, local merchants can attract customers to their storefront with free giveaways or coupons that Android users can see pop-up in real time on Google Maps.

THY COMPETITION ENSURES IT

This is not good news for Groupon, considering Facebook has nearly 500 million fairly engaged mobile users. Groupon, on the other hand, cannot boast a huge social media or search platform. As such, the daily deal site is dependent on people going out of their way to engage with its mobile app when looking for offers. The problem is, if people don’t find any relevant offers on Groupon’s mobile app, they might give up and jump on Facebook or Google, where they’re much more likely to stay engaged. It’s more advantageous for platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Google to insert on-site offers because people are already there.²

As Facebook and Google adapt to the dramatic consumer shift to mobile, Groupon’s days are numbered. Each will utilize economies-of-scale coupled with their massive reach to outflank Groupon, while smaller players like Yelp and Foursquare continue to nibble away at Groupon's market share one merchant at a time.

I fear that before it’s all over, Andrew Mason and crew will be wishing they had taken Google up on the $6 billion buyout offer while they had the chance.

For small businesses trying to shape a marketing strategy, the intense competition in the geo-local business space is a good thing, especially with the relevant players tripping over themselves to offer your brand a better deal.

Whatever you do, make sure to experiment with various platforms, and avoid committing to any large ad spend or long-term contract until you’re absolutely sure you’ve found the golden goose. Above all, remember that in today’s era of frenetic marketing-tech innovation, the only certainty is change.

Just ask Andrew Mason.

¹ Mashable, “More Smartphone Owners Use Location-Based Products”

² Venture Beat, “Why Groupon Now Won’t Work”

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