Game Book

The old school method of selling products and services online is fast fading. Traditionally, the process of e-commerce has typically happened in the following sequence:

1. Setup an online website or a store and populate it with applicable product(s) or service(s)

2. Work on organic search ranking for relevant keywords associated with the products or services in the hopes to achieve top search engine rankings so as to be found easily as visitors search

3. In addition or sometimes, as the only way, advertise via PPC and Media Buy campaigns and capture visitors

4. Visitors gained either via organic search or paid search are directed either to the product or service page directly or they are directed to a targeted landing page, where something of value is offered in exchange for their contact information (such as name, email, phone etc.). They are then followed up via email and voice auto-responder campaigns, again, with the goal to eventually convince them that the product or service being offered is worthy of their consideration to buy.

Today, the above mentioned steps, as the only method of sell, is almost non-existent. There is always some element of interactivity beyond the one-way approach that got e-commerce started. Blogging started the interactive revolution and is here to stay. Videos, with the availability of broadband, has become common-place.

Over the last few years, the interactivity has really blossomed. Although not for commerce, people started using the online media to get social. Communities started forming. MySpace kicked off the Social revolution, albeit targeting the young generation. Facebook also started off with the younger generation, but found a way to crack through to reach the wider audience as the place for social networking. Then Twitter came along, as the micro-blogging platform, where one could share the traditional blog thoughts in an easy-to-use 140 character snippet. YouTube became the go-to place for videos. This led to a full-fledged Social Networking revolution, with multiple Social sites spawning – whether for social networking or social bookmarking or other forms of social media. Today, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and YouTube (let alone all other networks) are so popular and so widely used that put together, if a Country; would be one of the most populous in the world!

One might think that we have come a long way after the humble internet beginnings of Netscape. Yes we have, although, we are only now getting started. With e-commerce and social media having fully matured in their own worlds, the marriage of e-commerce and social is now in the early stages of giving birth to a new industry. Welcome to new world of Social Commerce!

Social Commerce is fascinating. In the new Social Hub, Sellers won’t sell based on forced pitches, or extensive landing pages, they will sell with s-commerce in mind. The Social Market will be one where Buyers will look to what other buyers say in review sites, what they share as opinion in social networks, what they recommend as social shopping to others, and will seek social rewards for doing so, in the process. Social Commerce Marketplace will break the bounds of traditional commerce and will bring everything in the open. Social Commerce Platforms will form and will help manage the interaction with Buyers and Sellers efficiently. Outsourcing will lead to Social Outsourcing and no longer will people just source help, they will look to social sourcing. Buyers will look more for certainty, and less on haggling and negotiations. Fixed Price shopping would become the norm. Fixed Price Service offers will become common place. Social Commerce today is just starting up and social commerce websites are few and far between, however this is just the beginning. Social Commerce today is where E-commerce was in the early 90’s. The new S-commerce revolution is here.

Ghigg is the Social Commerce [http://www.ghigg.com] Platform for Firm Fixed Price Services. The Ghigg Social Hub enables S-Commerce [http://www.ghigg.com] and Social Outsourcing by empowering businesses to Give, Get and Gain.

It is commonly known that in most cases, one buys something based on psychology, and then justifies it later based on logic. Sellers who are effective in selling what they have to offer know this, and play it to their advantage. This does not mean that what is being sold isn’t worth it, or that the buyer is, in some sense, forced into buying. It just means that, in most cases, a buying decision is made at the spur of the moment, rather than within a thoroughly analyzed framework. This is particularly true in the online world, where the buying decision is just a “click” away.

So how is this accomplished? How do Sellers drive psychology into the minds of the buyer to influence a fast decision? There are a variety of techniques used, and one of the most influential of these is “scarcity”.

What exactly is “scarcity”? Think about it, what would you most want? It is what you cannot have or fear you cannot have. This is just how the human brain works. If you are given unlimited quantity of anything, you will soon lose interest in it, however valuable, pricey or tasty it might be. Pull it away after showcasing its value and you will go running after it, even if that supposed value isn’t truly there. Just the sheer power of losing out on something is the most powerful motivator of all.

Sellers have often used this very scarcity technique in the sales process for years, both offline and online. A variety of methods are applied here. Limited quantity of something makes you want it before it could run out of stock. Limited time availability of something makes you want it now, before that time runs out. And of-course a combination of these factors makes the scarcity even more prominent.

A technique that works is also showcasing sheer competition. Multiple parties interested in the same thing at the same time will always increase the value of the item for the fear that one might lose out on it if not grabbed in a timely fashion. Car salesman have successfully used this technique for years, where they always claim that someone else has shown an interest in purchasing and that if one desires to have it, the time is now. The famous “bidding war” concept isn’t any different.

Now, of-course in some cases, these are “real” reasons. Quantity might indeed be limited. The price might indeed hold only for a selected time. And competition might indeed exist. But that said, more often than not, these reasons aren’t always “really” real. This is most easily seen in the online world where you might find a seller offering an e-book download, and use the scarcity technique of “limited quantity”. Unless the server where the e-book is hosted on isn’t going to be available, or that the e-book would somehow self-destroy after the limited time, it is easily imaginable that this isn’t entirely “real” scarcity. It has been demonstrated that even this has shown to be effective in creating the “scarcity” fear in the minds of the interested buyer!

While the above techniques work and “could” be real, there is another method that always works. And that is what we call the “Social Commerce Scarcity”. We would even venture to not call this a technique or a method, for the reason that it isn’t. It is “actual” demand dictated “socially”. This is scarcity that cannot be easily faked and this is scarcity that is difficult to create artificially. This is next-generation scarcity that will dominate the new world where social media and e-commerce merge by way of Social Commerce.

Social Commerce Scarcity isn’t a technique. It is a natural outcome of what really works, where there is true value. Sellers benefit because when a service is consumed socially, and when based on reach, ratings, relation, reviews and recommendations, multiple users consume the service offering, showcasing that fulfilling it is indeed subject to scarcity is most believable. As an example, if one is to offer a service to create a logo, it is obvious that given the time available, the person offering the skill is limited by time as to how many logos can be created in a given timeframe. Showcasing that the person has 20 orders in queue creates that sense of scarcity to the next interested visitor that, for the sheer fear of losing out on being able to get the logo made, will be naturally tempted to place the order before the person takes down the offer, or adds a note that the delivery of new purchases will take longer. In the world where the person is offering the service within a framework of a Social Commerce Marketplace or a Social Commerce Platform, the person’s order queue isn’t artificially inflated, and is a true reflection of what “others” are socially consuming.

The world is fast moving to adopt commerce in a social framework. In the next generation e-commerce world where social e-commerce is set to dominate, Social Commerce Scarcity will work well for Sellers. And the best part is, unlike in the traditional scarcity world, Social Commerce Scarcity will work even better for Buyers – as Commerce really should be. Welcome Social Commerce!

Ghigg is the next generation Social E-Commerce [http://www.ghigg.com/welcome] Marketplace. The Ghigg Social Hub enables SCommerce [http://www.ghigg.com/register] and Social Outsourcing and provides a Social Commerce Platform for Buyers and Sellers to benefit alike.

Mobile Commerce is a facility through which you can conduct commerce by the help of any mobile devices. This may include mobile phones, smartphones or other mobile equipments. It is popularly known as M-commerce. The development in technology has given a new start to mobile devices. Your mobile equipments have made your work simple. Many companies are choosing Mobile Commerce so that they can reach their potential customers within a minute. As a matter of fact it is a kind of transaction through which the ownership or right is being transferred so that you can use the goods or services through your mobile device.

There are certain advantages of Mobile Commerce:

1.Convenience – A portable device that helps you to store information and data. You can access the stored information anytime you want.
2.Accessibility – Your mobile device enables you to contact any information irrespective of time and place.
3.Security – Mobile Commerce also provide security depending upon the device used by the end-user.
4.Instant Connectivity – 2.5 G network gives you faster gateway to the internet. This has happened due to the emergence of GPRS OR EDGE.

Mobile Commerce Company guides the customers to have easy connectivity to the products and services. The website that is particularly developed for mobile phones or other mobile devices is popularly known as WAP. Mobile Commerce Company provides unique service that would facilitate different organization with the accessibility of their website to their customers. The catalogs of the products as well as the services of that particular organization will be visible to the customers from their mobile devices. The demand of M-commerce is due to its lightweight, user-friendly and is available to everybody. Mobile Commerce Company allows you to book your ticket, avail information related to stocks, entertainment, and sports. You can also facilitate mobile banking which is a part of M-commerce, helps you to acquire knowledge regarding your account and allows you to make any kind of transaction.

M-commerce is taking the place of E-commerce at a faster pace. This is because the usage of mobile phone is increasing tremendously and more features are adding up every day to your mobile devices. Mobile Commerce Company will flourish in the market in the nearer future. As this is the concept is selling like hot cakes in the market. The mobile devices come with the high speed internet connectivity which is the essential factor of M-commerce. In this era of M-commerce it is ideal for every organization to adopt the technology that will make the business survive.

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These past 3 years, both mobile commerce as well as Facebook commerce have begun to draw a lot attention from the ecommerce community. There are a lot of research findings and stats available all over the internet. But though the figures are generally the same, the opinions as to what they might mean differs among ecommerce experts. Some caution about being too optimistic while others say that mobile commerce and social commerce, especially Facebook commerce, is a natural ecommerce progression.

Mobile Commerce Growth

Mobile commerce was supposed to take off in a big way in 2009 but it didn’t. The 2008 economic downturn might have something to do with that. However, mobile commerce is still growing and it is expected that 12% of all ecommerce transactions will go through a mobile device by 2014.

Just a few years ago, there were just a few smartphone models around and you could count the number to tablet models on one hand. Today, along with the iPhone, there are a countless number of Android, Blackberry, Windows, Bada and Symbian based smartphones in the market. In the tablet world, there are now about 85 tablet models to choose from.

The growth in the mobile device industry has resulted in the growth in mobile commerce. Many users started off using mobile devices to research items before purchasing them later via their laptops and desktops. This was because they were unsure of mobile commerce security, there were not many mobile version of sites available and smartphone screens were too tiny to make it comfortable to navigate an online site comfortably.

However with smartphone screens increasing in size, mobile security becoming more evident and more sites offering mobile friendly versions, the mobile commerce train in does not look like its due to make any stops soon.

Convenience Of Facebook

No long ago, ecommerce experts were saying that selling on Facebook would fail because people go on Facebook to socialize and not to shop. Stats now show that 25% of Facebook users would shop on Facebook. Facebook has now become one big online mall where you can catch up with friends, enjoy a video or 10 and shop at your favorite store because it has become so convenient to do so. Convenience has always been the backbone of ecommerce and it is really evident on Facebook commerce or f-commerce.

With Facebook adding millions to its user base every and 25% of whom could be potential shoppers, Facebook commerce is bound to grow.

With this realization, the big names in ecommerce solutions have created social store apps for their merchants in order take advantage of this potential revenue earner.

Granted, it is still early days for Facebook commerce but growth has been steady. Though shopping on Facebook will not overtake conventional online shopping anytime soon, it still has to be taken seriously as a decent avenue for sales.

Harry Goldberg is a retired ecommerce entrepreneur who has built and sold over 100 online stores. He now shares his ideas and tips on new avenues for revenue like Facebook commerce and where to obtain the best shopping cart software with built-in Facebook social shop app.

The internet has become the biggest market-place in the world. It is a giant web of different stores and products and companies, each vying for your business, or looking for your business, in order to purchase the products that you have to offer. Literally millions of online retail stores dot the landscape, each offering unique products and services that people are ardently searching for. Its an unfortunate fact of life, that not all of them are found. To a large degree, how well your E-commerce site will do in the overall online scheme of things, depends on you.

The online market is booming. According to the experts in retail, the average UK resident shops online at least one time per week, and about 44 percent of UK residents buy online. That total is actually lower than the U.S, where more than 50% of residents shop online and do so at least two times per week, spending an average of $25 dollars per trip. How much of that online cash will come to your website, and ultimately to you.

According to those same experts, the E retail market is growing rapidly. It’s picking up steam at a rate of about 15-20% over this time last year. Most people feel they get a better deal online and in many cases, the free shipping makes it worth their time to shop. Many E-commerce sites are international in nature, meaning that people from all around the world will shop there.

E-commerce has officially arrived. A lot of people are making a lot of money. Still more people are considering what they could do in E-commerce. There is a third group out there. The group of people who tried the E-commerce bit and found that it didn’t play out for them as well as they hoped that it might. Those people, by-and-large, went in without a plan. They weren’t entirely sure how the E-commerce idea worked, and they certainly didn’t have a plan of attack for a good website, great content, and a way to get noticed in the big wide web.

Along with being remarkably lucrative, it’s worth considering that E-commerce is also remarkably complex. Get it right and you’re going to make money that many people only dream about. Get it wrong and you’re going to be stuck with the vast array of costs that were inherent in setting up your website and your products and none of the compensation that should have come your way.

SEO for E-commerce Sites is, as anyone will tell you, a positive first step, but good SEO is imperative. A great deal of your success in your E-commerce endeavor is going to depend on your search position. That position will be won by a combination of a great site and a good SEO team that uses well applied search engine optimization and well planned marketing.

No matter how perfect, how attractive, or how compelling your website is, if it isn’t found, and no one can read all that great content, then conversion is impossible. The SEO on your e-commerce site is going to make the ultimate difference between whether you succeed or fail when it comes to sales. If you are making a business of your E-commerce website, and you are serious about your sales, then you’d better also be serious about your SEO campaign.

If you’re not in the know about E-commerce SEO then it’s time to get educated and learn a bit more, but it’s also time to find someone who does know SEO.

If you really want to reach for the brass ring, then find yourself a competent and qualified SEO company with expertise in e-commerce SEO. Yes, there is a vast difference between SEO for Joomla, or WordPress, or E-commerce. Run a mile from anyone who tells you otherwise.

Your professional SEO company knows that you need a quality robots txt, solid meta tags on every product page, great content, as well as knowing how to avoid penalties for things like duplicated product descriptions.They can tell you the importance of a good XML sitemap, and how to find the right keywords for getting you noticed. If your SEO company can do all that, then you’ve got a very good chance of success.

Just a common sense tip: ask for references and don’t be reticent to check them. It’s a major red flag when you are told that they don’t have any sites that you can check or references that they can offer you. If there are no websites in their portfolio, and you really are depending on your team to guide you in the right direction, then consider expanding your search to find a team that doesn’t mind offering you a reference or two.

When you’re involved in E-commerce, several things will combine to give you the conversions that you want. The website has to be attractive, intuitive, and easy to navigate, and the SEO on your website has to be solid. Getting the SEO right for your E-commerce site is imperative, making the difference between rousing success and dismal failure. Make sure you get the right SEO team to give you every chance of success.

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