General Motors' Buick and GMC divisions are using Facebook's application programming interface to create a link between vehicle research and configuration and the all-important opinions of friends and family. The new Facebook integration on GMC.com and Buick.com allows consumers who are building and configuring Buick and GMC vehicles to save them in their own directory on the site and then share the configured vehicles with Facebook "friends" who can post comments or "like" their customized selections. That commentary appears on the user's Facebook wall as well as in a more streamlined array on the personalized area of Buick.com or GMC.com where they have saved their configured vehicles. General Motors' GMC truck and SUV brand, which completely reconfigured its consumer site in April, also recently launched a mobile showroom application that allows consumers to use smartphones to configure a vehicle and review competitive comparisons, peruse local dealer inventories, request a quote, schedule a dealer test drive or view offers. Buick will launch a similar application. The two brands also have Apple iPads that mirror the shopping tools on buick.com and GMC.com. Janet Keller, digital and social media manager at GMC, tells Marketing Daily that the new Facebook integration "is about learning how consumers use social media and improving upon the shopping experience." She says that until now, consumers had been doing build-your-own (BYO) vehicle configuration online, "but it was sort of cut short, since we hadn't facilitated their getting input from friends and family, which is something we know they are doing on their own anyway." She says the new app, in addition to letting consumers save multiple vehicle configurations, also enables them to decide with whom they want to share those configurations, and to see what each said about the vehicles at the GMC.com site, rather than having to go to Facebook. Keller adds that down the road, GMC will look to personalize the configuration experience, "because the connection with Facebook allows us to get insights in terms of consumers' interests and pursuits. That means at some point we can help them choose as they are narrowing down their selection, based on their interests." The company will not need to generate a lot of buzz around the new application, per Keller. "We get about two million people visiting GMC.com every month and about a quarter of them actually go through the BYO process, so there will be a lot of people going through that process and interacting with the Facebook connectivity." Jim Kruger, digital and social media manager at Buick, says the division's use of the Facebook API is a work in progress -- since the automaker is one of the first brands to launch it, and because the Facebook integration offers a new way to examine social-network ROI. "When we first heard about the Facebook product we were eager to put it up and get learnings, and we will do ongoing research to see what the next evolution will be. This is basically step number one, and it will probably change over the next 12 months as we find out what consumers like," he says, adding that GM will also roll out out similar integrations with Facebook at Cadillac and Chevrolet. Kruger says the social media integration fits with Buick's buyer psychographic, as Buick owners index with owning tablets and smartphones more than any other GM brand. "They are very interactive-savvy. Year-over-year, Buick.com traffic is one of the few that keeps increasing."
General Motors' Buick and GMC divisions are using Facebook's application programming interface to create a link between vehicle research and configuration and the all-important opinions of friends and family. The new Facebook integration on GMC.com and Buick.com allows consumers who are building and configuring Buick and GMC vehicles to save them in their own directory on the site and then share the configured vehicles with Facebook "friends" who can post comments or "like" their customized selections. That commentary appears on the user's Facebook wall as well as in a more streamlined array on the personalized area of Buick.com or GMC.com where they have saved their configured vehicles. General Motors' GMC truck and SUV brand, which completely reconfigured its consumer site in April, also recently launched a mobile showroom application that allows consumers to use smartphones to configure a vehicle and review competitive comparisons, peruse local dealer inventories, request a quote, schedule a dealer test drive or view offers. Buick will launch a similar application. The two brands also have Apple iPads that mirror the shopping tools on buick.com and GMC.com. Janet Keller, digital and social media manager at GMC, tells Marketing Daily that the new Facebook integration "is about learning how consumers use social media and improving upon the shopping experience." She says that until now, consumers had been doing build-your-own (BYO) vehicle configuration online, "but it was sort of cut short, since we hadn't facilitated their getting input from friends and family, which is something we know they are doing on their own anyway." She says the new app, in addition to letting consumers save multiple vehicle configurations, also enables them to decide with whom they want to share those configurations, and to see what each said about the vehicles at the GMC.com site, rather than having to go to Facebook. Keller adds that down the road, GMC will look to personalize the configuration experience, "because the connection with Facebook allows us to get insights in terms of consumers' interests and pursuits. That means at some point we can help them choose as they are narrowing down their selection, based on their interests." The company will not need to generate a lot of buzz around the new application, per Keller. "We get about two million people visiting GMC.com every month and about a quarter of them actually go through the BYO process, so there will be a lot of people going through that process and interacting with the Facebook connectivity." Jim Kruger, digital and social media manager at Buick, says the division's use of the Facebook API is a work in progress -- since the automaker is one of the first brands to launch it, and because the Facebook integration offers a new way to examine social-network ROI. "When we first heard about the Facebook product we were eager to put it up and get learnings, and we will do ongoing research to see what the next evolution will be. This is basically step number one, and it will probably change over the next 12 months as we find out what consumers like," he says, adding that GM will also roll out out similar integrations with Facebook at Cadillac and Chevrolet. Kruger says the social media integration fits with Buick's buyer psychographic, as Buick owners index with owning tablets and smartphones more than any other GM brand. "They are very interactive-savvy. Year-over-year, Buick.com traffic is one of the few that keeps increasing."
Tesco became one of the first U.K.-based retail chains to implement radio frequency identification technology in the mid 2000s. At the time, the company's chief information officer created a strategy that would rely on RFID tags and readers to keep track of inventory. In 2005, the retailer signed a three-year contract with Tyco Fire & Security's ADT Security Services, purchasing 4,000 radio-frequency identification readers and 16,000 antennas to outfit its stores and distribution centers throughout the United Kingdom. Moving to an online strategy now in place, Tesco pushes the limits again with paid search to find ways to simplify processes similar to what RFID did for its supply chain. The company began using Kenshoo Editor in May 2010, and managed to quantify a 40% time savings in search engine marketing (SEM) management by June 2010. Although unconfirmed, this might signal a change in culture amidst the marketing department. In June, Tesco plucked advertising agency Evans Hunt Scott CEO Matt Atkinson, appointing him to group digital marketing officer, to help expand digital marketing operations worldwide. It appears that Atkinson has been spending time improving the company's social and search strategies. Tesco launched its Facebook page in March, and now has more than 265,000 fans since April. For paid search, the Kenshoo Editor, similar to Adobe SearchCenter, brings an enterprise technology platform to the desktop to help Tesco create new campaigns and optimize multiple channels in minutes. It allows marketers to fulfill bid changes and other commands faster because the tool is not online. It's on the desktop. Kenshoo CMO Aaron Goldman pointed to the transition from desktop tools such as Microsoft Excel to online tools in the cloud and now back to the desktop. "Excel let you set up pivot tables much faster," he said, pointing to Kenshoo's decision to bring it back to the desktop by building an application specific for managing search campaigns. "Marketers are no longer beholden to the latency in any online interface, and the time it takes to download, work on the numbers, and then upload the information back into the system." The Editor drag-and-drop and copy-paste features make it quick to implement bulk changes across large, complex accounts. Rather than working in an Excel spreadsheet, the applications were built specifically to manage online search campaigns. Aside from Editor, Kenshoo RealTime Campaigns allows Tesco to sync SEM campaigns with actual inventory availability and dynamic merchandising, making ad placements more relevant and effective. When items go out of stock, the platform identifies the inventory level and drops the ad from the rotation cycle. Barnes & Noble, Golfsmith.com, LendingTree, TicketsNow, and Zappos also use Kenshoo Editor, according to Goldman.
I attended the Social TV Summit in Los Angeles yesterday. (Actually, it was held at the Bel Air Country Club, but that's another story.) As the summit's title suggests, it was a day spent listening and talking about how social media is intersecting, enhancing and altering television viewing, media and advertising. It was a great conference and hit a hot topic at exactly the right time. Noted media economist and co-host Jack Myers grabbed everyone's attention with his opening remarks, boldly predicting that social TV marketing would be an $8 billion to 12 billion annual market by 2020. While I haven't fully gotten my head around those numbers yet, Jack is a good friend and has been extraordinarily accurate in his macro market projections over the years, so I'm inclined to believe them, particularly when you consider them within the context of the $40 billion to 50 billion annually which he has previously forecast for all of social media marketing by 2020. Where will all of this money come from? Here are some of my thoughts: First, what is social TV? While I don't think you can really nail down a great definition of social TV at this point, since it's so nascent, I view it as all of the activity occurring at the intersection of social media and television devices and programming. It includes second screens used while watching TV, networked companion devices that support or relate to TV, social tools and applications on connected TVs, and all of the TV-related content and conversations on social media. TV viewing plus Web and social use is big. Users spend an enormous amount of time surfing the web while watching TV. 78% of users do both at least monthly, and one-third of all Web browsing occurs in front of a TV. Companion device usage while watching TV is big, too. 35% of tablet and iPad usage occurs in front of the television, and this is before we really have that many robust and specialized applications to truly enhance or support better TV viewing experiences. Many (including me) predict that app-enabled iPhones, tablets and iPads will be the dominant "remote controls" for home television in a few years. Strong measurable linkage between TV viewing and social media expressions. Companies like Blue Fin and TrendRR are doing incredible things bringing Web-like Big Data crunching visualization to TV-related social expressions. Now, marketers and their agencies can know exactly what and how many social expressions their TV ad impressions generate. Lots of new TV-related social tool. Check-in tools have become big in location based services. Similar tools are now available for TV viewing. Services like GetGlue and Miso are helping TV networks and programmers establish loyalty-based relationships with their viewers, enabling them to "check-in" while viewing, earn badges and even get show stickers sent to them in the mail. Will this add up to $12 billion annually in nine years? I don't know, but I do think that it's going to be really big. What do you think?