5 key benefits of Magento Social for your ecommerce business
One of the key takeaways from the recent 2017 Magento Imagine conference in Las Vegas was the emergence of Magento Social. It was a welcome announcement for Magento users and a timely solution for merchants seeking an easy and effective way to integrate social channels with their ecommerce stores.
Head of Insight at Space 48, Oliver Lees, was out in Vegas for Magento Imagine 2017 and he outlines the key benefits of Magento Social for ecommerce businesses:
User-friendly social media channel integration
The great thing about Magento Social is the ease of getting your brand moving with social media. The solution removes the need to navigate back and forth from different sites and social networks to create and distribute social ads, campaigns and activities.
It means that ecommerce stores aren’t so reliant on numerous third-party plugins and integrations – it gives more control to merchants. The feature ensures retailers don’t have to be experts on social media to create an impact and enables businesses of all sizes to enjoy success with social.
Direct access to database and customer insights
Magento Social offers a more seamless integration of social channels with ecommerce websites. It’s so much easier now to set up a Facebook store, for example. These Facebook “shops” can now be synced with product catalogues and databases on ecommerce stores, helping to automatically feed in product data. Facebook ads can be populated with product details and images and tie up with user data and analytics, to help brands and marketers create more relevant ads and consumer experiences. Therefore, the whole process of linking up social media channels and targeted campaigns to drive sales through ecommerce stores is less resource-heavy.
More immersive customer experience for consumers
Magento Social helps to improve both online and offline experiences. Creating localised social media ads is made easier, meaning that retailers can increase the footfall of their physical stores. It also provides more engagement opportunities for retailers and helps build more strategic targeting, boosting customer acquisition. Magento Social satisfies the growing necessity for brands to deliver more seamless omnichannel commerce experiences.
Consumer trends are now driving ecommerce strategies. Consumers are ever more comfortable with receiving brand messages, advertising and marketing in an array of different forms, so it follows that brands should give their customers easier routes to purchase via social channels.
In the same way that consumers want less friction and clicks at the checkout and payment stages on ecommerce stores, with platforms like Magento 2 responding with a more streamlined checkout process, the same goes for browsing products via social. There’s more trust with brands and apps – think Uber – and there’s been a breakdown of fear for consumers, like previously with AdWords. Consumers are savvier about marketing techniques but are more receptive when they can see the value and a well-supported customer experience.
Synchronicity between marketing, sales and product teams
Magento Social empowers ecommerce businesses to leverage their data better for social media activities and another progressive benefit of the solution is the ability for key teams to collaborate and synchronise. It enables greater visibility across Marketing, Sales and Product teams, so they can learn from each other, feed into each other and help optimise processes. From a commercial point of view, Magento Social creates more nudges along the customer journey, building brand awareness and continuity of brand messages, leading to better ROI. Internal teams working efficiently together can only mean a better experience for customers.
Encourages brands to be more ambitious with their social strategies
“86% of social media users want to follow brands on social” – Magento
The key benefit of Magento Social for many brands will be the ease of getting a product to market. More cautious retailers can come out of their shell and be a bit more ambitious with their social media activities – as Magento Social will give them the confidence to do so. It helps less-experienced brands and encourages merchants to venture into channels for which they were previously reluctant.
Summary
Social media is a key way to reach customers. Magento Social helps merchants to improve their targeting, tune into the mindset of modern consumers and start to see the benefits of social for connecting with consumers throughout customer journeys, from initial engagement, to the first sale, to turning customers into advocates. Ultimately, Magento Social helps ecommerce businesses to be more efficient on social and focus budgets and resources on the right channels.
Space 48 is a leading ecommerce agency, specialising in Magento and Magento 2 website development and ecommerce strategy. We’ve created award-winning ecommerce websites for major brands. To find out more the benefits of Magento 2 and its key features and functionality, download our free guide to the Essentials of Magento 2.
