Uncover the consumer insights you’re missing with social media

Kim Bielak, Marketing Manager, Shopkick

It’s 2018 and no secret by now that social listening is a great addition to your market intelligence toolbox. But is your brand really taking advantage of the wealth of information about your consumers that you could be harvesting from this rich digital soil?

As a Marketing Manager responsible for both our social media channels and various market research sources at Shopkick, pouring through insights, feedback and personal stories from our users on social media is one of the most rewarding parts of my job. It never fails to give me a refreshing new perspective on why we do what we do.

So, whether you’re new to social media or just looking for new ways to share the voice of your consumer throughout your organization, here are 4 ways I’ve come to find social media incredibly valuable in finding insights that can translate into real business impact.

  1. Understand Your Core Audience Demographics & Interests

You have at least 4 communities with platform-provided analytics at your fingertips to understand who your core customer is, and your sample size is generally not insignificant. Not only can you triangulate age, gender, household income, and other demographic information from sources like Facebook and Twitter Analytics with your other customer data sources, you can also find an enormous source of additional color from asking questions such as what your fans’ favorite music, movies, and books are.

One way you can do this is to type queries directly into Facebook Search like “[Musicians] liked by people who like [Brand].” (Not a bad way to source talent or options for your next spokesperson, eh?) Similarly, services like DemographicsPro will analyze your followers on Instagram and can tell you their affinity with other Instagram accounts, media, and even their most-used hashtags.

  1. Listen and Look for Patterns

You know the saying: you have two ears and one mouth for a reason. Your customers are out there telling you exactly what they like, exactly what they don’t like, and exactly what they want, and you just have to pay attention long enough to notice it!

First, find out where your brand is coming up organically in conversation by doing a search for your brand’s handle, hashtag, or search term. If a consumer has gone as far as to include you in a public post, it often means one of two things: they absolutely love you, or they absolutely hate you. Be prepared for and really listen to both. While the former is often hard to hear, don’t be too quick to brush it off as whiney behavior. Complaints are often one of your most valuable sources of data, providing clues as to why you’re losing sales, or previously loyal customers. Even if you believe your brand is in the right, remember, your positioning is always in the eye of the consumer, and if you’re seeing a certain perception over and over, you know where you have work to do.

Then there’s the brand love (the best part!). These are your advocates. Are there patterns, or common and relatable things many of your customers have experienced you can source insights from? At Shopkick, we see people talk about using the app to get their steps in as they walk around the mall, going on Shopkick dates with their significant others, or even using the app as a game with the kids to keep them manageable in the store. These are all insights about the unique way people are using our app we didn’t even have to ask for, and have been repeated time and time again. We’ve even been able to mine Facebook comments about some of the brands we work with and have found second uses for products like cat litter and yogurt containers!

From there you can then do the same types of searches for your prospects, competitors, and the larger cultural conversation. If you’re looking to launch a new product, go into a new vertical, or pursue a new target audience, see how consumers are already talking about it. A yogurt brand might search terms like “Greek yogurt,” #Whole30, or even just #breakfast to see what consumers think is significant enough to share. And pay attention to trending topics on Twitter and Google trends, as they are often the first places the next big thing pops up before your insights team has had a chance to do a focus group about it.

Finally, I venture as far as to suggest following your customers and your target audience. Don’t be creepy about it, but within reason, many people get excited when their favorite brands follow them back! This is one of your purest forms of ethnography, as you have a chance to see your customers in their everyday environments. Notice what they include in their profiles, the photos they share, and the moments they find significant. This is truly one of the greatest ways to put a face to your consumer and foster a sense of empathy with their hopes, challenges, and ultimate business needs.

  1. Ask Them!

I’m not suggesting you ask for your fans’ household income and divorcée status on Facebook, but do ask engaging questions as a great way to acquire some qualitative quotes and insights. For example, we ask our users what they’re saving their Shopkick reward points (called kicks) for all the time. It was on Facebook that we discovered the wealth of users saving their kicks for Disney vacations, but were doing so by cashing out for Target gift cards in the app, and then re-buying Disney gift cards in-person at their local Target stores! If we had only looked at our internal gift card redemption data, we would have seen what we already knew: Target was one of our most popular gift cards. Never would we have realized that so many of our users actually wanted us to add the option of a Disney gift card instead. Needless to say once we added it, our users were very pleased.

Another way to translate these insights into more quantitative data is to export your comments and code them. We recently asked our users what else they wanted to earn kicks for and were able to codify over 800 responses to determine the most popular requests. Once we found the offers we didn’t have enough representation for that were in high demand, we were able prioritize outreach to new partners and business development. We also had the great added value of new crowd-funded ideas we may not have previously thought of, such kicks for experiences, video streaming, and, once again, rewarding people for getting their steps in!

  1. Create a Testing Ground

Finally, testing is one of my favorite uses of social media that often gets overlooked. Say you’re looking to run a major new ad campaign, or exploring a messaging refresh – you have 365 days to experiment with the light version on social media before you commit to your whole investment! At Shopkick, for example, we’re planning a brand campaign where we’ll be delivering a wish in every state across America this year. Not a small program to risk the types of responses we were going to get in. So, while we were still in concepting, we asked users what they’d wish for first on social media. Not only did we get a flood of responses to demonstrate that the campaign definitely resonated, but we also got tons of insights from fans’ wishes to guide the direction of the overarching campaign message itself. You may not be able to A/B test an ad or a new product every day in the real world, but with social media you have the ability to test and iterate on an idea rapidly until you strike something that truly makes an impression with your community.

At the end of the day, social is only one piece of a full market research toolkit, but it’s certainly one with a lot of unbridled potential, and not to mention wildly cost effective. The rise of social media, big data, and other digital intelligence sources should not become a reason to neglect traditional research methods such as focus groups, IDI’s and prospect surveying. However, if you haven’t yet recognized the power of social media, don’t miss an incredible opportunity to bring the voice of the consumer to your organization. It’s a powerful way to continue to inspire and remind your team of the real faces and the real people whose lives your brand touches each and every day.

 

The best free shopping apps to download today

The best free shopping apps to download today

I am continuously in awe of how fast-paced the world is these days. I remember how, as a kid, my mom use to spend hours and hours going over all the ads in the Sunday paper, writing down the best prices, and making a list of which stores to shop on which days. And, don’t even get me started on how much time she spent clipping paper coupons!

Luckily, to save oodles of money shopping these days, we don’t have to put in nearly as much time. In fact, reaping the kind of savings that used to take our mothers hours can be done almost with the push of a button on our phone thanks to free shopping apps.

For those who don’t know, the best free shopping apps can save you just as much money as a clipping paper coupons used to. How it works is simple: you go shopping as you normally would, whether that’s in a store or online. Then, you get points for your normal shopping activities, including walking into stores, scanning barcodes to learn more about items (or watching videos online), and making purchases. You can even earn rewards for shopping online. Then, you trade those points in for cash back or gift cards!

Best of all, you can download the best free shopping apps in minutes, on both iPhone and Android, and quickly be on your way to major savings, all in about the time it took your parents to look over the ads from a single store. You’ll wonder how your parents ever put up with something so slow.  

…the best free shopping apps can save you just as much money as a clipping paper coupons used to.

Because there are a lot of different shopping apps out there these days, I’ve put together this handy guide to the best free shopping apps. Read up, and make sure you pick the right one based on you and your shopping needs!

The Top 5 Best Free Shopping Apps

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Canopy:

Sticking with our theme of saving precious minutes, can we talk about how using Amazon can turn into a real time waster? At least it can for me anyway. The site has just too much variety! For ages, I used to wish someone could curate Amazon so I could go straight to the items that I am most likely to buy.

Actually, that’s the concept behind one of the best free shopping apps. Meet Canopy, a site full of human-curated fashion, lifestyle items, and home decor products—all of which are available for purchase via Amazon. Tastemakers curate the site, making it easy to bypass all the pages of utilitarian stuff on Amazon that is no fun to browse. Oh, and if you’re a tech geek (which I totally am), you’ll love that Canopy features a user-centered design aesthetic that keeps things simple. I use Canopy quite a bit to save time shopping and have bought everything from beach towels to luxurious bed sets.

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The Hunt:

Do you ever find yourself getting sucked into Instagram? I know I do. I love love love Instagram, and one of my favorite things is how it lets me keep up with new styles. Some of the models I follow even let you know where you can pick up the fashions they’re sporting. Other times, however, I find myself just taking screen grabs or photos of cool clothes, and then have to spend even more time trying to track down those fashions. Well, The Hunt makes all of this much easier and quicker. You just hop on The Hunt and post your photos, then sit back and wait as your fellow fashionistas check out the pics, rack their stylish brains, and let you know where you can buy that fashion find! Oh, The Hunt also has a feature where you can ask the community for tips on outfits, which kind of makes it feel like you’re all shopping together!

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Flipp:

Okay, so I know I’ve been knocking coupon clipping, which seems a bit outdated in our digital world, but it was once pretty convenient. What Flipp does is bring old-school savings into the digital age as it lets you browse ads and circle items using a shopping app on your smartphone! Flipp essentially combines both the best of the old world—the colorfully and clearly laid out stacks of savings—with the best of the new world—the speed and convenience of shiny new tech. With Flipp, users get access to a digital library of all the latest flyers, plus an interface that lets them build shopping lists within the app. No pen or paper needed. All you have to do is open up Flipp, find the flyer for the store you’re heading to, and tap on a specific product or a digitized coupon within the flyer. The app then automatically circles it for you, subsequently adding it to your digital shopping list. It’s quick, free, and best of all, easy!

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Coupon Sherpa:

Flipp isn’t the only app that recreates the experience of clipping paper coupons. There is also Coupon Sherpa, which is one of the best free shopping apps that gives its users a list of hundreds of coupons from leading stores. As with Flipp, there’s no need for that messy coupon book system our parents used to track and take advantage of their deals. All you do with this app is show it to the cashiers, and they can scan the deals for you right there on your phone. Like many of the other apps on our list, Coupon Sherpa is also good about giving you convenient extra features, including a store locator, as well as easy social options so that you can share deals and coupons with your friends, too! There’s nothing like spreading the love out there, let me tell you.

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RetailMeNot:

RetailMeNot is another app that simulates coupon hunting, just at a much larger scale than some of the other choices on our list. With RetailMeNot, users get access to more than 50,000 retailers and food offers at thousands of local restaurants and stores, as well as at nationwide chains. It’s also easily customizable, and you can use it to look at what the most popular deals are among other shoppers. Or you can use it to enjoy your own personalized set of offers. I like to have RetailMeNot send me alerts whenever deals come up at the stores I go to most, so I never run the risk of missing out on major savings. You can just use it for its categorized searches or location-based deals alerts. As with all of the rest on this list of best free shopping apps, it’s totally up to you!

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Slickdeals:

Slickdeals is another great aggregator in the same vein as RetailMeNot. It collects deals from a wide variety of sources and then brings them all together in one browsable place, saving you both time and money once you make good on the offers. This is a very versatile app that features deals on everything from electronics to groceries to clothes to kid stuff. I generally stick to the front page on Slickdeals, which has a running list of the most popular local deals in my area, but I’ve poked around the rest of the app and run some searches that brought up tons of other great offers, too! Another commonality this app has with RetailMeNot is that it lets you set alerts so you don’t miss out when your favorite stores offer deals.

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Ebates:

Ideally you want an app that can help you save on both your online shopping as well as at brick-and-mortar locations, but at least Ebates solves for one of these. This app really excels in helping you save on your online shopping by giving rebates and coupons at 2,000 online stores and websites, which is certainly nothing to scoff at. I’ve used it in the past to get cash back on a wide range of purchases, including those I’ve made at some of my favorite online stores.

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Shopkick:

Of all the amazing, free shopping apps out there that save you both time and money, my favorite is Shopkick. Shopkick gives you points—which you then turn into gift cards—for soooo many things. You can use it when shopping both online and at brick-and-mortar stores (vital in this day and age), plus you get points for things like walking into a store, scanning the barcodes of products to get more information, making your purchases, visiting certain online stores, and watching videos about select products. There are so many different ways to score points that, for me, using Shopkick often turns into a fun game, kind of like a scavenger hunt for points. The thing about this game though, is when it’s over, I can trade those points in for gift cards to some of my favorite stores! Lately, I’m on a big Starbucks kick, which is where I cash in most of my points, but last month I used gift cards to save money on my toiletries, and the month before it was clothes. There’s just so much versatility.

Best of all, I think I’ve actually combined Shopkick with most (if not all) of the other apps on this list—at least those that give you access to coupons. That’s because those coupons let you save at the register while Shopkick gives you points as a reward after your purchase. It’s like a double whammy. I’ve also used it in tandem with The Hunt and Canopy since those are the best free shopping apps for finding what you want to buy, while Shopkick is the best choice for getting savings back on your purchases. And that, my friends, is how you can use multiple rebate apps to maximize rewards.

So, play around, learn all that you can about each of these free shopping apps, and then choose your own personal faves. These are all free, after all, so the only risk is a tiny little time investment. Rest assured, it’s nowhere near what our parents spent in the old days hunting through store flyers and collecting coupons!

Download one of the best free shopping apps, Shopkick, today and join a community of loyal Shopkickers who’ve already discovered the rewards of shopping with a free, smartphone app sidekick.

And, if you love social media as much as you love your smartphone, join Shopkick on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram for a little daily shopping inspiration.

Tips for mCommerce customer relationship marketing

Customer relationship marketing is a segment of marketing that focuses not on the immediate sale but rather on ongoing business. Obviously, the value of a loyal customer is high. In fact, it’s estimated that a 5% increase in retention can lead to a 25% increase in profitability. However, keeping customers shopping with you can be a challenge, especially when you consider how many options these customers have. This is especially true for emerging channels, like mCommerce, where just about every major brand or retailer is trying to gain market share.

the best customer relationship marketingFor an effective customer relationship marketing campaign, companies need to bring together three key components: They must create trust, establish a customer connection, and reward customer loyalty. All of this needs to occur in a digital space, which can be a challenge without the face-to-face contact that a brick-and-mortar business can deliver. Using innovative mobile apps that remember your customers and encourage them to revisit your brand can help you develop a customer relationship marketing strategy that offers true, enduring value.

Creating Long-Term Customer Trust

Building long-term customer engagement in mCommerce requires establishing your brand as a leader not just in your industry but also in technology. That means providing a secure environment where consumers will feel comfortable sharing their mobile information. In one study, just less than half of consumers reported that they’d only feel comfortable shopping via mobile if their phone number was protected. About 44% reported that they were concerned that mobile payment options were not secure. Allaying these consumer concerns requires offering:

  • Transparency: A clear user agreement, showing exactly how your company collects data and how that data will be used, goes a long way toward improving the perception of your company’s trustworthiness.
  • Payment technology: The accounts that your company accepts payments through must use the most recent security technology to prevent hacking and other malicious attacks. Digital wallets are also growing in popularity, with 51% of consumers wanting to use retailer apps for making faster purchases through such methods.
  • Usability: More than half of consumers report that a poor experience on a mobile site makes them want to disengage with a company. You only have one chance to make a good mobile impression, so ensuring your site is performing at its best is key to keeping customers engaged.

You need to be able to build trust with consumers if you want them to engage with your brand online. However, trust alone won’t keep consumers coming back. For that, you need to use your app to cater to your consumer on a personal level.

Leveraging a Personal Touch in Customer Relationship Marketing

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is becoming a popular option for companies that want to create a closer connection with their consumers. AI allows you to remember a consumer, predict their actions, and make recommendations based on those predictions. This is a strategy that retailer Cosabella implemented, which reportedly led to a 30% improvement in conversion rates.

The company used an AI program, called Albert, to help better identify potential customers on a global basis. Albert was able to review millions of pieces of trend data and then make predictions on when and where those trends would be most popular. It was a job that would take the average human, or even agency, months to tackle.

Using a few basic data touchpoints—like location and prior purchase history teamed with customer profiles—can help you target the right offer to the right customer.

Of course, not every company needs to roll out a high-tech program. Instead, using a few basic data touchpoints—like location and prior purchase history teamed with customer profiles—can help you target the right offer to the right customer. It’s also possible to use this data to determine genuine signals of purchase intent and to filter out fraudulent traffic. This saves you marketing time by allowing you to focus on the best prospects. It also creates a personalized connection that you can leverage to build customer relationships. The final step in all of this is to use a customer rewards program to incentivize purchases.

Round Out Customer Relationship Marketing With Rewards

The process of customer relationship marketing does not end at purchase but rather is an ongoing strategy that requires continued engagement. One way to manage this is by offering a customer rewards program via a mobile app. Such programs allow you to incentivize purchases at less of a cost. Here is how the system works:

  1. The customer downloads a shopping app, like Shopkick, and uses that shopping app to earn rewards for engaging with your products or retail locations.
  2. When the customer collects enough points (known as kicks), they can redeem them for gift cards. This encourages a return visit, where the customer can purchase even more, and earn yet more points.
  3. The purchase cycle continues.

These rewards benefit the customer and the company since you avoid the margin cut of an immediate discount and instead deliver on brand affinity. Finally, it makes the customer feel like you value their repeat business, ultimately building loyalty.

Building customer trust, offering a personalized experience, and finally, rewarding loyalty all work together toward developing a strong customer bond. The customer comes to rely on your brand because they believe it is focused not only on the bottom line but also on their satisfaction. These cornerstones of customer relationship marketing allow you to build consumer loyalty in the online marketplace, even when those customers have virtually thousands of options available to them.

Shopkick can be a valuable part of your customer relationship marketing strategy. For more information on becoming one of our partners, contact us.

Image courtesy MrMrsMarcha