Social Media Trends

Pinterest E-Commerce Now Open for Business

06/03/2015 by Clinton

That time you spend on Pinterest may now be categorized as more than mere “research,” now that the social platform is launching long awaited pinterest e-commerce functionality.

In what is already being called the fashion catalog 2.0, Neiman Marcus, Macy’s and Nordstrom are among the retailers that will be partiipating in the platform’s “Buyable Pins” feature, which was launched today at Pinterest’s San Francisco headquarters and showed us that by the end of June, you’ll be able to choose size, color and other options directly from a pin on your iPhone or iPad.

The demo showed pinners being able to weed through pins based on price points, using an example of results from Rachel Roy items that were within the 100 dollar-range. You’ll even be able to scroll through more images of the same product before tapping “buy.”

Macy’s group Vice President Serena Potter said being able to close that pinning and buying experience is “a huge win” for the department store. “Our ability as retailers to capture our consumers in that emotional moment is what Pinterest is able to do to make that emotional connection.” she says.

Neiman Marcus VP of media Natalie Bowman tells Pret-a-Reporter that the buyable pins will help items like Valentino rockstud heels live even longer. “The lifespan of products on Pinterest is much longer—we see a lot of items from older seasons continually being pinned.”

With brands like Kate Spade and Cole Haan (and more to be announced this month), eCommerce platform DemandWare is in on the deal too. DemandWare’s Marketing SVPElana Anderson says they saw an increase of purchases on mobile phones by nearly 60 percent each year.

Cole Haan is rolling out their next catalog entirely on Pinterest. “These guys came to us in April and since Pinterest is the ultimate visual wish list, and now to make that buyable—why wouldn’t we do this?” says VP of Cole Haan global digital Josh Krepon.

Neiman Marcus’s Bowman agrees the buyable pins are a reinvention of the traditional 10-page catalog mailer — now it’s endless. “With over a million pins from Neiman Marcus, people are self-curating all of our items into beautiful boards into their own catalogs.”

Bowman says with this partnership, she expects to see more results with Neiman Marcus’s next cashmere capsule. “It will allow our shoppers to shop more quickly,” Neiman Marcus VP of media Bowman says. “Personally, I might spend a little bit more.” We feel you, Natalie.

Shoppers can pay using credit card, Apple Pay or Stripe. By the end of the June, it’ll launch on iPhones and iPads but Androids will have to wait for the roll-out later in this year.

From our Pinterest daydreams to our shopping bags, this is where the future of shopping starts. It will be interesting to see how celebs and influencers play into the action–perhaps curating board for brands and really driving up those “buy now” buttons.

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Why Current Facebook Changes Are Bad News

02/25/2014 by Clinton

Music marketer says it’s time to start focusing elsewhere, you know that the inevitable loss of Facebook as a valuable marketing tool is approaching.

We’ve been through phases of Facebook reducing the reach of one’s fan page and both pro music marketers and industry watchers like myself have focused on the combined strategy of not putting all one’s eggs in one basket while still finding ways to improve the likelihood of fan page posts appearing in fans’ news feeds. So when a well-established music marketer says it’s time to start focusing elsewhere, you know that the inevitable loss of Facebook as a valuable marketing tool is approaching.

From a bigger picture, Facebook has made it clear that they’re limiting traffic to fan pages and you’ll have to pay to get the reach you really want. But that can mean different things for big brands than it does for small fry like many DIY and indie musicians.

Facebook is Privileging Big Brands in the Newsfeed

In fact, in terms of news, some publishers are seeing increased reach and more traffic over the last few months.

This is confusing until you find out that Facebook is privileging particular brands and you’re probably not going to be one of them if you’re not well known.

It’s a “quality” thing and since Facebook math still can’t identify quality Facebook is identifying such things at the “source level.” This is something Google has been doing for years and it’s why SEO pros often point out that certain big brands get a pass on rules that negatively affect almost everybody else.

Unfortunately nobody with any pull or focus has really looked at how this works for big bands vs. smaller acts. But there may be a correlation there as well.

And Things Are Looking Grim for Small Biz Pages

In any case, this post by Mary Green on the effects of Facebook’s development on small biz pages led music marketer Madalyn Sklar to write:

“Just another reason why you should start focusing your social media marketing efforts on Twitter, Instagram and (gasp!) Google+. This latest Facebook algorithm change is killing your Facebook reach.”

I haven’t been keeping up with her approach of late so I don’t know how much of a shift this is at the moment since we’ve all been trying to decide how to deal with Facebook. But it’s a pretty clear statement about FB’s reduced value.

That said, it’s hard to go cold turkey and if you want to squeeze out what value you can, check this whitepaper from CyberPR with a soberly practical take on the situation.

We’ll see how this plays out but Facebook is definitely becoming a weaker tool for DIY and indie musicians and music marketers. And that’s just how it is.