It pays to drive shoppers from social networks to your site. Consumers who click from social networks to retail sites or share an item on a social network spend an average of $126.12 on a retail site in a 30-day period, 8.2% more than the $116.55 average that other shoppers spend, according to a new report from social marketing vendor AddShoppers.
The report, which examines consumer behavior in the 30-day time period after a shopper clicks to a retail website or shares an item on a social network, is based on data gathered from AddShoppers’ more than 10,000 retail clients last year. AddShoppers’ technology lets retailers add buttons so site visitors can share products via email, Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus or shopping-focused social networks like Wanelo and Polyvore. The content of those shares includes a URL shortener, Shop.pe, that AddShoppers has branded. AddShoppers then tracks any clicks on those links and monitors whether clicks lead sales.
While the data shows that social networks users can be valuable customers, not all social networks are alike. Here are the average conversion rates by social channel for products shared via AddShoppers’ system:
- Email, 9.4%
- Google Plus, 3.7%
- Facebook, 2.7%
- Twitter, 0.6%
- Pinterest, 0.5%
While Facebook’s conversion rate is significantly lower than that of email and Google Plus, its massive size—the social network has 1.39 billion active users—and popularity—it accounts for 74% of all shares—helps it account for 69% of the social-driven revenue for AddShoppers’ clients. The remaining 31% of the revenue driven by social sharing is produced by:
- Twitter, 12%
- Pinterest, 8%
- Email, 6%
- Google Plus, 3%
- Other social networks, 2%
“Retailers have to focus on Facebook,” says Jon West, AddShoppers CEO. “It’s the 800-pound, maybe 8,000-pound gorilla when it comes to social sharing.”
However, retailers have to understand the nuances involved in Facebook sharing. For example, Facebook offers several ways to share products and information, including the Like, Share, Want and Own buttons. Of those options, only the Share button, which is worth 3.4 times more than a Like share, is worth using, he says. The conversion rate for consumers who click a Share button is also 5.4 times more than a Like. The Own and Want buttons rarely lead to sales.
Facebook’s Share button has become more valuable than other buttons the social network offers because the formula Facebook uses to determine what consumers see in their news feeds favors Share, West says. And when a shared product appears in the news feed it features a larger image, which makes it more appealing than items consumers pass on to their contacts via other buttons.
The report also found that each time a consumer shares a product on Facebook, it leads to an average of 1.1 clicks. That’s 12% higher than StumbleUpon, a personalized search engine, which generates 0.98 clicks per share. Here are the top five social networks in terms of clicks per share:
- Facebook, 1.1 per share
- StumbleUpon, 0.98
- Twitter, 0.97
- Wanelo, 0.94
- Pinterest, 0.87