Marketing Pilgrim Published: “Facebook: It’s Good To Be The King!” plus 4 more

Facebook: It’s Good To Be The King!
Holidays, Charity and Daily Deals
Has Internet Marketing Made the Meet and Greet Obsolete?
Free Shipping is the Battle Cry This Holiday Season
Video: Unboxing the Google Cr-48 Chrome Notebook

Posted: 10 Dec 2010 06:12 AM PST

Below is a chart that shows the dominance that Facebook has worldwide as the leading social networking site. The chart was brought to my attention by Robin Wauters of TechCrunch.

The next chart shows the place and show networks for each area of the world.

So let's try something a little different today. Rather than you read about my take, opinions, ramblings or whatever you might call them, let's have you tell us what your reactions are to pictures and charts like these?

So you know the numbers come from Vincenzo Cosenza's World Map of Social Networks. Nice work, Vincenzo!

Holidays, Charity and Daily Deals

Posted: 10 Dec 2010 05:24 AM PST

In an interesting look at the daily deal phenomenon that has everyone chattering in the recent past, some researchers have taken a look at whether daily deals influence how people do two things related to giving (at least in theory): holiday shopping and charitable giving.

First, eMarketer reports on data from another daily deal player, Eversave. Of course, we offer the usual "remember the source!" warnings since someone like Eversave has a vested interest in getting the word out to fight against the Google of the deal space, Groupon.

This first chart relates to how people may or may not turn to deal sites for holiday shopping.

Honestly, I was a little surprised that not everyone would say they would. One thought on why this is not unanimous in its use could be that they would be perceived as cheap if the deal factor was discovered (incredibly shallow I know but what percentage of holiday gift giving do you think is done for effect rather than actual caring?). Another could be that whatever the deals are just don't fit the shopper's target.

The other area looked into is the influence of charitable giving as a way to get someone to bite on a deal. Here the numbers surprise just a bit because, honestly, I am not sure whether charitable giving is a true trigger to making someone buy anything. It's a nice bonus but would someone make a purchase decision that they were considering as 'marginal' just based on the fact that pennies go to a charity? Maybe so but that metric as a real incentive to take a deal is one that needs a further examination.

So what about you? Using deal sites to do your holiday shopping? Do charitable contributions sway your deal purchases? Inquiring minds want to know here at Marketing Pilgrim so share your take in the comment section.

Happy Deal Finding!

Has Internet Marketing Made the Meet and Greet Obsolete?

Posted: 09 Dec 2010 09:57 PM PST

There was a time when marketing men were like politicians. They had to shake hands and kiss babies, take district reps out for a lunch meeting and have dinner with the guy who could open up new territory but those days have gone the way of the piano lounge in the airplane. Now, we video conference with the reps, connect with customers by email and Facebook and use Linkedin to network with the guy who can help you open a store in Kansas.

Yeah for the internet! But Renee Huang of The Globe and Mail says that the internet is a poor substitute for the old fashioned meet and greet.

"Research in the business-to-business world suggests the No. 1 reason for selection of a supplier is the personality of the sales team or seller. This is above the technical specs, marketing form, anything else.”

Huang goes on to talk to several small business owners who say that face time with potential clients and customers was key to their success.

Now, I’ll admit that as a collective, we’ve gotten overly dependent on the internet. My friend recently lost her home connection for two days and you would have thought she was living without food and water. I’m not mocking, believe me, I feel the same way. I work and play online. I’ve never met 99% of the people I do business with, but that hasn’t stopped me from doing business and doing it well.

My husband, on the other hand, is a face-to-face guy. When ever I’m frustrated over a communication breakdown with a client he starts in with, “why don’t you try picking up the phone instead of this ridiculous emailing back and forth!”

Ah! Texting! That’s the answer!

I guess the biggest advantage to a meet and greet is that it’s harder to say no to a person’s face than to their Facebook. And I suppose that some people will reward the effort if you show up at their office with a box of cupcakes (even if you’re not selling cupcakes.) But when it comes to you, to your business, do you really think that your business would be better off if you could travel the country and pitch your wares one-on-one?

Face time, if you can get it, is a good thing, I’m sure. But when I count up how many business emails I get after midnight and on weekends, I doubt that anyone has time for a leisurely lunch to discuss the sale of a new product. That is, unless you don’t mind meeting at an all-night diner.

What are your thoughts on face time versus connecting via the internet?

Free Shipping is the Battle Cry This Holiday Season

Posted: 09 Dec 2010 01:36 PM PST

Free shipping! Online retailers are shouting it from the rooftops and it could be the key to staying out of the red this holiday season. ComScore worked the numbers and discovered that unlike last year, the percentage of transactions with free shipping continued to rise after Black Friday. Last year, free shipping orders dropped to 45% late in November, but this year they climbed to 55.1%.

I do the majority of my holiday shopping online and I noticed this trend long before I saw this report. Nearly every online store I visited was offering free shipping on any size order. That’s not just a boon for people buying a whole sleigh full of presents from one retailer. A no threshold offer encourages people to buy small items that would have been too pricey with shipping included like a $5.00 pair of slippers from Kohls.

The good news for retailers is that the average order with free shipping is $125.20, 45% higher than orders with paid shipping. So what you lose in shipping, you should be making up in sales.

The numbers point to a trend that comScore thinks will continue through this holiday buying season and beyond. Consumers have grown to expect free shipping and 84% of those surveyed said it was somewhat to very important.

Free shipping, 50% off discounts, bonus gifts with purchase — if things keep going like this, in a few years retailers will be paying customers to shop with them. . . actually, I think some of them already are.

Video: Unboxing the Google Cr-48 Chrome Notebook

Posted: 09 Dec 2010 12:19 PM PST

Marketing blogs don’t get to do a lot of “unboxing” videos, but thanks to a free gift from Google, I get to be one of the first bloggers to get my hands on the new Google Cr-48 Chrome Notebook.