Shopping alone, with friends

One of the subjects being discussed in the build up to this weeks World Economic Forum in Switzerland is eCommerce 3.0 and the impact on bricks-and-mortar retailing.

eCommerce 1.0 was about setting up imitations of the offline world, with virtual shelves.

Version 2.0 saw websites transformed into multimedia portals that tried to engage. They were about push (not just pull) – convincing customers to snap up that special deal, to follow an impulse.

Now eCommerce 3.0 is slowly emerging – except nobody is quite sure yet what it will look like. What is clear is that it will be mobile, and it will be social – shopping alone, with friends!

What’s interesting is that it’s already working. Following recent advertising spend directed at the company’s Facebook fans, Walmart got a direct ‘paid’ return of $257 for its direct advertising spend. But made another $1,173 of revenue as the message spread through their network of friends. Fans ‘liked’ it, posted reviews/comments, friends of fans piled in and bought too…purchasing gone viral.



What can we learn as we head into our own Recruitment 3.0 world?

I asked Martin Cerullo, Global Director of Resourcing Communications.

“I have two thoughts. Firstly, are we really thinking about how we get our clients’ employees to act as ambassadors for their employer brands through their own social media, and use this energy to drive employee referral programmes 3.0 rather than the traditional ERP internal poster and HTML email? Secondly, are we creating engaging content to drive dialogue with candidates [our fans?] and hence brand awareness [with friends of fans]?”




So. Should one of our operational KPIs with clients be how many candidates are fans, and a measure of how these fans are engaging with both the client brand and their personal networks?

Jerry Collier
Jerry Collier

Jerry Collier is Global Director at Alexander Mann Solutions

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