CRM - December 2007 - (Page 33)

USER-GENERATED CONTENT Which Web 2.0 application has the greatest potential to INFLUENCE CONSUMER MARKETS? Facebook 36% reviews as one of the primary reasons for their purchase—either online or offline, according to a ForeSee Results report. Only 17 percent said reviews had little or no impact on their purchase decision. Second Life 24% 30% 9% 1% MySpace del.icio.us Twitter SOURCE: ASSOCIATION OF NATIONAL ADVERTISERS develop into actionable insight. And yet, UGC is usually the product of customers who should clearly be a top priority. Online users are not only influential, Decker says, “but they’re [usually] high spenders; they’re repeat purchasers.” He advises companies to encourage these individuals to continue posting comments, hopefully stirring up more conversation and more interest. Ratings and reviews are a start, but it’s quickly evolving into something much more than just content on your site, Decker says. When Petco.com wanted to increase its user participation, for example, the company offered the opportunity to win a $100 gift certificate at the end of a single month. All customers had to do was write a review about a product they purchased. According to Squire, Petco saw the number of reviews multiply eightfold. Offering an incentive is one motivation, but the interesting subplot is the fact that Petco.com continued to sustain UGC production even after that particular promotion ended. Experts have observed that it takes just a single review to prime the pump. “Once [users] see other shoppers filling out reviews and helping others, it just feeds on itself,” Squire says.“It’s just a virtuous cycle.” As the product reviews start to accumulate, people begin relying on those reviews for their shopping guides. After they’ve purchased and experienced the products, they, too, are more apt to fill out a review, especially if prompted with a follow-up email. Of people who bought from a site with reviews, 44 percent mentioned customer www.destinationCRM.com STICKS AND STONES For businesses afraid of the unpredictable impact of reviews, incorporating user content should be viewed as a necessary disruption. Companies need to believe in their brand, believe in their product, and be true to it every day. In the grand scheme of things,“one voice isn’t going to destroy your brand,” Squire says. Moreover, companies should avoid being too sensitive—not every complaint is necessarily detrimental to business objectives. Corporate sites employing UGC, however, may want to consider some degree of content moderation even though the Web is generally considered a free realm. “There are gaps that are wholly acceptable and legally advisable that brands need to invest in,” Rollins says. Violence, pornography, and offensive language are considered to be legitimate reasons for a company to remove Bazaarvoice combined its review technology with analytics software from Coremetrics to measure the impact of the reviews. Quantifiable data fed into Coremetrics reveals information such as who the user is, each user’s purchase history, and how much each user spends. More important, the software quantitatively measures which reviews are best at increasing conversion rates. This helps determine which quote is best in an email, an online banner, or even on a poster in the physical store. Regardless of whether or not marketers want to loosen their grip on their campaigns, UGC is an undeniable force that cannot be ignored. The shift from push to pull marketing has put the consumer in control and for the most part, it has improved marketing efforts dramatically. “Sites that are getting high satisfaction scores and the ones that are continually growing their base of loyal customers appear to be using user-generated content at a very high level,” Squire says. He observes that marketers who have accepted the influence of the iCitizen are “invested in it, they believe in it, they’re using it to design their go-to-market It often takes just a single review to open the floodgates of user-generated content. Corporate-owned sites employing UGC may want to consider some degree of content moderation. a customer posting. To deter such behavior, most sites require user registration or have messages sent through an internal system for review before they get published. Companies have few rights that allow them to censor privately owned content or third-party sites. strategies around marketing, merchandising, and customer experience.” UGC will only become more important as businesses reap the benefits of engaging in conversation with their customers. Customers want to help one another and they want to know about good products. Companies can focus on the basics to set the stage for that exchange: Forget about technology, forget about analytics—it’s the customer who’s most important. “When you have [UGC] on your site, and people raise their hand and share their voice, they are very valuable customers,” Decker says. Contact Editorial Assistant Jessica Tsai at jtsai@destinationCRM.com. 33 SOFTWARE LENDS A HELPING HAND Decker says that a company that relies on outsourced help to handle UGC reduces two major obstacles: first, the IT cost of effectively collecting UGC; second, the time-consuming task of actually processing it. According to Decker, Bazaarvoice improved in six weeks the level of UGC processing that Overstock.com had been juggling internally for four years. CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT | DECEMBER 2007 http://del.icio.us http://Petco.com http://Petco.com http://Overstock.com http://www.destinationCRM.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of CRM - December 2007

CRM - December 2007 Contents Front Office Reality Check Customer Centricity SAP’s Midmarket Design A Shift in SAP’s Growth Strategy: Buy Big to Get Bigger The Buyer Is Your Owner Prime Time for Streaming TV The Word on the Floor Market Focus: Energy/Utilities: Speaking Truth to Power (Companies) The Pulse Required Reading It’s All Coming 2.0gether Power to the People Speak Up! Document Management That's a Breeze Customers Gain Traction With Off-Road Vehicles Getting Connected With Surveys Mobile Data Gets Better Reception Secret of My Success Re:Tooling The Tipping Point Pint of View

CRM - December 2007

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