While some groups have been busy preemptively criticizing social commerce and any new ventures into Facebook commerce (F-Commerce), others have taken a creative lead and elevated the industry to a new level.

Heinz, we thank you. With the creation of a “pop-up” limited time store on Facebook, you’ve become a prime example for those looking for a role model of successful F-Commerce.

As a big business, Heinz demonstrated the core principles of successful social commerce by offering a limited time promotion allowing Facebook fans to create and buy customized “Get Well” cans of soup for friends or family. Was the promotion incredibly profitable? No. In fact, that wasn’t the point.

“It wasn’t a revenue-driving activity, but more of a creative campaign to engage with consumers,” explained Nigel Dickie, director of corporate and government affairs for Heinz UK and Ireland.

Was this social commerce initiative successful? Yes. Considering Facebook’s inherently social and familial nature, the brand aimed to tap into the more personal side of their customers. This connection would have otherwise been impossible on a traditional brand website, and Facebook’s sharing features ended up elevating the promotion to something remarkable. Generating over 32,000 “likes” and 40,000 interactions with the F-Commerce shop, eMarketer reports that the campaign was in fact very successful in a truly “social” way.

Looking at the promotion in more detail, what can we learn from Heinz and their “Get Well” soup Facebook store?

1.) Creativity is king. Heinz made an attractive looking campaign. Using snappy, pre-like page graphics, and clear calls to action, this promotion left the creativity up to users as they composed their customized soup can messages. In this case, the creative element was also the most “buzz-worthy,” as Heinz allowed fans to share their own customized messages with Facebook friends. The idea, in the first place, was highly creative and demonstrated a higher level of thinking about a rather basic product. By thinking outside of the traditional mindset of “we must sell soup to customers,” Heinz proved that creativity is king in social commerce promotions. Users don’t want the same experience they could get by going to a traditional e-commerce store. They want something unique, creative, and worth mentioning.

2.) Money isn’t everything. As mentioned earlier, Heinz should be commended for realizing that not all promotions, or “shops” for that matter, are best measured in terms of sales numbers. In this case, they found that one in eight fans would buy something from the F-Commerce shop, but how can you put a price on the 32,000+ fans gained during the promotion? The countless shares and word of mouth recognition? All these factors contribute to “brand value,” a metric that leaves short-term monetary value completely out of the equation. Finally, when the focus goes from money to genuine engagement, people and media take notice.

3.) Limited availability drives action. Heinz Soup UK made their store available for a limited time, during the colder winter months, when many fans probably had sick friends and family. Then, only lasting for four weeks, the promotion conveyed a sense of urgency to sign-up and share soup. As opposed to leaving the F-Commerce store open for business constantly, Heinz made the strategic decision to make it a limited-time offering. The result? Increased word of mouth buzz and comments regarding availability. Looking on the Heinz Soup UK Facebook wall today, there are still comments asking for more customized soup! As a result, if and when it comes back online next time, the promotion will be even bigger and more popular, don’t you think?

4.) Personal connections drive social commerce. Clearly, the biggest take away from this example is the fact that it highlights just how effective a truly “social” store-front can be. The feeling and phrase “Get well soon” is an age-old part of our society, and a warm bowl of soup is still sometimes seen as the best cold medicine. What Heinz capitalized on with its store was nothing more than human emotion at play. People like to share and make others feel better. In this case, a customized can of Heinz soup from Facebook was just what the doctor ordered.

Again, thank you Heinz for stepping up and reporting F-Commerce results. The industry needs more shining examples such as yours. When the tools are readily available, there is no excuse for companies large and small to step up to the precedent set by Heinz, and create memorable, engaging social commerce experiences. Get creative!

Lastly, we offer many thanks to Dr. Paul Marsden for again providing great food for thought with his article on Social Commerce Today. Social Commerce Today is the leading online journal covering new trends and technologies in “social commerce” – the use of social technology in the context of sales.

Original post by: Fanpage Toolkit

“Everything you do starts with your Facebook Page.” On that note by Facebook’s VP of Product, Chris Cox, we are glad to learn that the long-awaited introduction of Facebook’s Timeline for Brand Pages is finally here!

I have to say, after having the personal Timeline from the very earliest stage of development, I’m quite excited for this long overdue update to Facebook Pages and what it will do for social commerce and marketing.

“As social media transforms other industries… we’re not doing it, we’re allowing partner companies to make change… It’s not US, it’s WE all together.” With those statements, Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook, expressed her excitement with the new Facebook Timeline for Pages, emphasizing Facebook’s role as a partner in the marketing and social process of brands. In fact, to me, it seems that there’s never been a better time to get inolved with Facebook on a deeper level!

Clearly, the update makes things look snazzier, but what do these changes mean for Facebook apps, marketing, and the bigger picture of social commerce in general? I want to go through some of the changes I’ve learned about and share my perspective on how they might impact Facebook commerce [a.k.a. F-Commerce] and marketing.

1.     Cover photo is big and beautiful. At 850 x 315 pixels you now have the real estate to get your branding on and display your wares. Your profile picture, which needs to be 180 x 180 pixels, will now be your logo. Facebook suggested at the FMC event that this profile logo should never change. It is the branding part of your Page that will be carried throughout all your posts and in the newsfeed. Facebook also released a set of guidelines for the cover photos. Make sure to check them out before creating yours. The basics are…. No price or purchase information. No contact information [this all belongs in the About section]. No references to Facebook features or arrows. No calls to action. No false, misleading or stolen IP materials. In the short of it, Facebook wants your cover to be more of a photo then a sales ad.

2.     App tab links are now front and center. Now called the “Views and Apps Row,” this change was most apparent to me as I previewed Brand Pages with Timeline. It appears that Facebook is giving brands the space to display three key app tabs along the top banner, which are all re-orderable [note: the “Photos” tab is not able to be changed]. The rest of your app tabs are hiding behind a numerical button that expands. In the case of a Brand Page focused on F-Commerce, this would be the perfect space to highlight a store or promotional app. Because they are placed at the very front and center, these apps are likely to earn a lot of attention from visitors. Additionally, all apps are able to be outfitted with customized images to better represent your brand. Be creative and you’ll be rewarded with click-throughs and views!

3.     Apps now get their own separate space. One of the other biggest and most drastic changes I’ve noticed so far is that after clicking on an app (traditionally a tab on the left), users are now taken to a completely new and separate Page only filled with the contents of the app. In this case, Facebook’s interface almost seems to take a back-seat to the app, giving the apps room to breathe and let content shine. In the past, apps were hosted in more of a “frame” like space surrounded by other buttons and links. Now, Facebook has added a simple, persistent tool bar to the top of the app screen, allowing users to jump back to the profile or other apps on the Page.

4.     More room to create? It would also appear that Facebook has now given us an 810-pixel wide space to build out app content. Now, that’s a lot of space! And it’s a huge jump from the previous 520-pixel width that frustrated so many of us. We truly can’t wait to see how brands fully utilized the new space. Imagine the richness in quality this change will help bring to Facebook Stores, Promotion Pages, Welcome Pages, and picture content!

5.     Default Landing Tab is history. While tabs today will now get increased visibility, Facebook is eliminating the ability make your tabs the default landing destination to your Page, when non-fans visit your Page for the first time. As of today, you can still “LikeGate”, which is an attempt to force users to become a fan of your Page. This is part of Facebook’s effort to streamline the user experience while still providing brands the ability to program content and host any content on your Facebook Page. A big plus, is that all tabs will still have unique URLs [now referred to as, “Link to this Tab” when in edit mode] allowing these unique URLs to be copied and used in promotional material, ad campaigns, etc… directing viewers to any non or “LikeGated” content for conversion.

6.     Where are the ads? Presumably, in this “app tab view” mode, sidebar ads have been disabled. But with all that blue space on the right side of the app content area, we can assume at some point Pages will be seen with relevant ads like on our personal Timelines today.

7.     Images and Likes are now emphasized. If the new layout teaches us anything about content posting, we can see clearly that posts containing images are now highly emphasized.  Not only do images get more attention, but also the other Pages that your Page “likes” are now placed right in the middle of the Timeline. In the case of a brand, this provides a great chance to cross-promote and share related brands with your fan base. Pinned posts now allow you to anchor the most important story to the top of your Page for up to 7 days, while highlighted posts now allow images to take up the full width of your Page. These features will be perfect for emphasizing special items, featuring a sale or promotion, or calling out a great post by fans.

8.     A greater sense of what friends are doing. Another leap for the “social” aspect of social commerce is Facebook’s integration of “Friend Activity” on Brand Pages. What does this mean for your Facebook store? When users visit your Page, they’ll automatically be shown activity by friends who have interacted with your Page. Maybe they’ve bought something from your Facebook store, or maybe they’ve commented on your wall. Either way, the new Timeline will highlight friend activity even better than ever, helping to keep the social in social commerce!

9.     Message your favorite brand directly. This update is huge for companies looking to engage fans and create customers out of their audience. Now, for the first time, a visitor can directly ask a question to the administrators of a Facebook Page. What makes this even more exciting for social commerce is that conversations can now take place privately between a brand and a customer, increasing the opportunity for two-way communication. Not all messages are meant to be public, and this new messaging feature is just the answer for small busineses and big brands looking to make a more private connection with their fans.

10.  Offers get promotions in front of your customers. Built right into Facebook is a new tool that allows brands to push promotions and discounts right to their fans via a wall post. Right now, only a few companies (like Macy’s) have access to the tool, but we’re eager to find out the reach this promotional tool could have for small businesses and organizations.

So there you have it, Timeline for Facebook Pages. Keeping all the changes in mind, we at Fanpage Toolkit can’t help but be excited for the future of Social Commerce and Marketing opportunities on Facebook. We’ve created a robust set of tools that is fully compatible and scalable with Facebook’s new changes and layout, and we’re fully committed to providing increased innovation of our own as Social Commerce and Marketing evolves. Without change, we’d never innovate the way we do and advance the industry. We applaud Facebook for offering the ability to adapt and change with them.

And to answer the big question, will Timeline have an impact on F-commerce? You bet. There are more creative, personal, and promotional tools than ever before available to users and their Facebook Pages. Fanpage Toolkit just adds another layer of depth to these evolving features, transforming Facebook into a full-blown Social Commerce and Marketing Platform!

Original post by: Fanpage Toolkit

Humans, by nature, are social creatures. We thrive on personal connections and small-talk. We enjoy the company of others. So, what lessons from human nature can we apply to the emerging Facebook Commerce “F-Commerce” market? To me, they’re clear. But, I’ll let you decide for yourself.

Before I get into it, though, I want to thank Marsha Collier for pointing out a blog post by Hugh Briss, which explains the recent (andsubtle) changes to the standard Facebook page layout. The post jump-started my thinking about the inherent “social” nature of Facebook and, in turn, what users (or potential users) of Fanpage Toolkit can learn from these changes.

What value does Fanpage Toolkit’s service provide by brining traditional e-commerce store fronts into the Facebook ecosystem? Though the change that Hugh pointed out is a very subtle shift, its implications for F-commerce and Social Commerce are huge, impacting a core component of the technology: the “social” component.

So what is this subtle change that I believe speaks volumes about the value of bringing commerce to Facebook pages? A slight shift left in alignment of Facebook pages.

With this small shift in page alignment, Facebook has made room for the “news ticker” and full friends chat list, both of which are extremely dynamic and social elements of Facebook’s environment. It is this shift that really has me excited for the potential of F-commerce and for what Fanpage Toolkit offers its users.

Think about traditional online shopping (e-commerce) on retail sites like Gap or Piperlime. While these sites may offer a “social” experience by offering Facebook “Like” buttons or Twitter sharing, are your closest friends available on these sites, ready to chat or comment with the click of a button?

No. On Facebook, they are more than ready and willing to chat, “sitting” right next to you in the chat interface.

In fact, in 2009, over 1 billion chat messages were sent per day on Facebook’s proprietary messaging system. That’s a lot of socializing. As a natural extension of our social circles, Facebook’s power lies in its ability to provide a sense of “connection” by facilitating conversation between friends and family. So, we should ask ourselves why the typical teenage group hangout is usually a local shopping mall or popular store. Why do people enjoy shopping together? It is clear that the social nature and connections formed by gossiping, shopping, and experiencing products together make the activity better for everyone involved.

Now, of course, Facebook cannot completely recreate the personal, human interactions that a group trip to the mall can. But chat, video calling, and other sharing options come close to making interactions on Facebook as human as possible. So with this in mind, why would any internet retailer opt to limit their customers’ “social experience?” With F-commerce, and Fanpage Toolkit’s integrated store fronts, we become one step closer to simulating the commercial experience so many people value in real life.

Imagine the social shopping experience an F-Commerce solution like Fanpage Toolkit can provide, combined with Facebook’s subtle shift in layout. While browsing products on a brand’s Facebook store, users are able to see real-time updates and “likes” from their friends on the opposite side of the page. And more importantly, they are able to chat. Removing any feeling of isolation, and providing a sense of community, Facebook’s chat function, combined with in-Facebook store transactions powered by Fanpage Toolkit, provides a unique social commerce experience.

As more users begin to experience a truly social commerce experience, F-Commerce will gain undeniable traction. Every traditional E-commerce website will soon have an F-commerce counterpart, and will be driving social connections in ways traditional websites could only dream of.

So, the last question is, are you going to “get social” with your commerce solution? Or are you going to keep your customers in isolation, with just their cart and a handful of items? We hope you get more social with F-Commerce!

Original post by: Fanpage Toolkit

“The market for social commerce has been embryonic to date, but that will change over the next five years as companies race to establish stores, pushing up social commerce revenues sixfold, to US$30 billion globally.”

Opening heading via -Booz&co [Turning “Like” to “Buy" Social Media Emerges as a Commerce Channel]

So, as you just heard… social commerce is predicted to reach an astounding $30 billion in global sales of physical goods in the next five years. That’s a lot. And while social commerce currently sits at about $5 billion in sales of physical goods, according to Booz and Company, the industry is poised for considerable growth. So, who is going to step up to the plate and start selling?

When will we see a brand truly own the social commerce space? So far, three companies come to mind as being recognized for their social commerce efforts on Facebook: 1-800 Flowers, Pampers, and Wine Market Australia. The last was recently recognized for achieving over $30,000 in sales directly within Facebook. Using new social commerce solutions, such as Fanpage Toolkit, companies have begun to engage their customers in new ways, but few have truly taken the step to own the social commerce arena. Or, am I missing something? Do you know of any brands actually owning the space and innovating?

So, let’s get back to that 30 billion number. Where is your cut of that forecasted social commerce market share? What are you doing to contribute to the enormous growth predicted by researchers? Social commerce doesn’t have to be hard, and truthfully I believe that it will come as a natural extension of Facebook and other social networks as soon as one or two big-name brands start using the tools at their disposal. Booz and Company seems to agree with my sentiment, in the report mentioned earlier.  Listed below are what the analysts of the report consider to be the four imperatives for getting started with social commerce, with my commentary added.

Imperative 1: Jump in soon and learn by doing.

“It is usually a good idea to study a new opportunity loosely, but given the fast pace at which social commerce is evolving, companies must be willing to learn while doing.” As I said, we’ve yet to see a company truly jump head-first into the social commerce arena, let alone the Facebook commerce portion of it (otherwise known as F-Commerce). When the barrier to entry is simple, and access to powerful F-Commerce tools is FREE, there is no reason more people shouldn’t be jumping into the mix and experimenting.

Imperative 2: Develop a strategy for getting the data you need.

“What would a company most like to know about social media?” When approaching social commerce, realize that there is more data floating around social networks then you can wrap your head around. By completing transactions within a social commerce system, users are sharing personal information, demographics, and other data that is essentially “gold” to any commercial endeavor. Does your social commerce platform offer an analytics tool to capture that value? Geo-location, engagement, and key words are examples of important data points that are able to be captured from F-Commerce. When entering the social commerce arena, make sure you’re armed with the tools to get the data you need to achieve commercial success.

Imperative 3: Define what the customer experience should be.

“Companies should use tests, pilot projects, and sociographic data to map out different social commerce strategies to get a sense of what their customers will see, how they will respond, and what they like best.” This is an important factor in the successful adoption of social commerce, and more specifically, F-Commerce. Users have come to expect a certain secure, simple experience when buying online. Buying within Facebook should be no different.

Imperative 4: Integrate social commerce into an overall multichannel strategy.

“As social commerce becomes a bigger part of the overall sales mix, it is important to understand its position in the company’s broader multi-channel strategy, and in particular to determine the impact social commerce will have on other channels.” Simply said, a F-Commerce storefront cannot stand on its own. As with any other commercial effort, a solid, well-rounded marketing strategy is necessary to truly gain traction among customers and potential users. To round-out the marketing mix, budding social commerce mavericks and newbies alike should look for a full suite of promotional apps, sweepstakes tools, and robust support for their Facebook brand pages.

When everyday users take note of the above imperatives, and especially when large brands take note of these important suggestions, the social media community will begin to see a meaningful leap ahead in social commerce activity.

Original post by: Fanpage Toolkit

2012 is going to be a memorable year. Whether it is the year you finally get serious about dropping those extra pounds you’ve been “resolutioning” to since 2002 OR it is the year you save up the money and courage to go on that dream vacation. We have a solution for you. Instead of focusing on cliché resolutions that you will more then likely forget about by February… focus on something that will truly deliver you maximum results. Get your social commerce store and marketing up and running now!

Remember that small to mid-size business that you own? Remember the Facebook page that your store sits on? Where you can upload pictures, publish wall post updates and best of all… where you can install super cool apps! Well spend some time on making it the best asset your store has to offer! Make the vow in 2012 to increase your marketing and social commerce efforts on Facebook!

For those of you who are not up to speed on the terminology, F-Commerce? F-Commerce is the ability to shop and sell, while incorporating social sharing and marketing tools to promote stores within the Facebook ecosystem. F-Commerce is the latest innovation in the online selling world and is the largest catalyst under the social commerce umbrella to date. Millions of stores across the globe are now turning to the Facebook phenomenon, with nearly 900 million users to assist merchants in selling their products within the Facebook ecosystem. What online merchants have to remember is that there is a right and wrong way to sell socially. Many small to mid-size businesses and even big name brands get so wrapped up in the “commerce only” side of things, that they think that just by having an F-Commerce “Shop” tab on their Facebook page, puts them ahead of the game.

Unfortunately, just having an F-Commerce store alone isn’t enough. F-Commerce has grown since 2009 and in 2011, 90% of the companies surveyed by the Altimeter Group have increased funding for social commerce initiatives by 8%. Also, according to the Altimeter Group 25% of customers between the ages of 18-34 said that they use Facebook to interact with merchants. So whether you are a big name brand like Coca-Cola or just a simple eBay store owner selling yoga mats, everyone can utilize Facebook for their social commerce destination. Now, despite the size of your organization and target market, there are some tips and tidbits that all F-Commerce store owners could use.

Here are some Do’s and Don’ts to social commerce and marketing that all companies using Facebook should oblige to in order to maximize their fans and shoppers. Don’t be offended if you see a “Don’t” that your page currently does… we are here to help!

Do Give Your Fans Special Treatment: What this means is, thank your fans for “Liking” your page by offering them promotions, coupons, sweepstakes, digital downloads and other fun things that they can only do via your Facebook page. By running promotions and sweepstakes, more people are likely to become fans and like your page. Also, by offering coupons and/or fun digital files for download, fans will feel appreciated and more engaged with your store. A great example of utilizing your online fans and rewarding them is Finish Line. Finish Line is a company that specializes in sneakers and athletic apparel, which currently has well over 800,000 likes on their Facebook page. Finish Line offers a sweepstakes to win a $100 Gift Card to their store by signing up for email updates and offers. It is an exchange that the customer is willing to make because they don’t mind giving away an email address for a chance to win a gift card. Promotions and other reward type programs, mixed with social interaction are what make Facebook pages worthwhile and what creates a greater interaction between fans and businesses.

Do customer service without neglect: Just because your customer service team doesn’t run your F-Commerce store, doesn’t mean that you should just let the questions users post float away. F-Commerce is all about collaborative sales, marketing and service… meaning, whomever is updating or moderating the shop’s Facebook page has to respond to all customer service related questions and comments. An example of a company who does customer service without neglect and always responds to 100% of Facebook users wall posts is Sammy Davis Vintage. Sammy Davis Vintage is a vintage fashion blogger and seller who sells vintage fashion. Sammy Davis Vintage is based in New York City and has about 3,500 Facebook likes on her page. Solely one woman runs the company and she always responds to anything that is published about her, and in a timely fashion, which is most important.

Do utilize the Reveal Tab (Pre-Like Page): Using a Pre-Like page, or a page that comes up before one has actually clicked the “Like” button is imperative. This is because it gives your company a chance to give a first impression to your non-fans. Using the Pre-Like page to promote a sale, giveaway, sweepstakes, digital download or really anything is a great way to interact with customers from the start of your page. Pampers, the baby goods company does a superb job of utilizing their Pre-Like page and driving in fans by saying “Join our community and connect with moms and dads like you.” They also have a banner ad saying “celebrate your baby and share your journey with us”. These two statements on their Pre-Like page are very enticing for parents to read. Parents naturally want to show their kids off and enjoy talking to other parents about raising their kids. Pampers ropes in likes by showcasing the fact that parents can connect to each other through Pampers Facebook page, and it works! Their Pre-Like page, along with an F-Commerce store and other apps is an integral part to their success and a big reason why over 900,000 people chose to click “Like” on the Pampers page.

Do use social sharing tools: Social sharing is one of the biggest reasons why F-Commerce and social shopping as a whole is so popular. People simply just want to know what their friends are buying, while buyers love to share their experiences. Just take a look at the Gilly Loco Salsa Facebook Store created using Fanpage Toolkit. Here you will see a more advanced Facebook sharing tool that allows shoppers to share their shopping experience with all of their Facebook friends at once, with the simple click of the mouse (to see this in action just visit the page for yourself). While on the negative flipside… if we look at the Facebook page of GoYerbaMate.com, you will see that they have NO social sharing tools running of any kind. Fans can’t send products to their own personal walls or friends walls to share what they are shopping for. Not utilizing social sharing inhibits your customers and fans and keeps your market very closed and narrow, which is never a good thing for any company.

Do create a microsite within your Facebook page: There are so many examples of the famous “Welcome” tab (or, Default Landing Tab) that Facebook page owners strive to build and publish. However, very few hit the mark with an elegantly designed, content rich microsite shining bright within their Facebook page. So, before diving into my example, let’s answer the question of, “what is a microsite?” To not reinvent the wheel here with definitions, the folks at Wikipedia tell us that a microsite is, “an Internet web design term referring to an individual web page or a small cluster (around 1 to 7) of pages which are meant to function as a discreet entity within an existing website or to complement an offline activity. The microsite’s main landing page most likely has its own domain name or subdomain.” Now, I can’t think of a better place for a microsite then within a website that has nearly 900 million users as part of its ecosystem. This website of course is Facebook, and the Facebook microsite that I am going to introduce you to is Zen Den Coffee. Zen Den Coffee, or The Zen Den as they like to be called… is a boutique coffee house located in Doylestown, PA. The goal of The Zen Den was to build a micro version of their official website for their Facebook page. The challenge that they were presented with was that no software solutions were available to both offer the ability to build a microsite within their Facebook page and create a future F-Commerce store to sell their in-store products. After sampling a few solutions but not getting anywhere, The Zen Den came across Fanpage Toolkit’s Social Commerce and Marketing Platform and began to build. When speaking with The Zen Den, they said that they were amazed to finally find a platform that was able to deliver the full solution of both marketing and commerce. All at the price of little to no cost. If you jump over to The Zen Den Facebook page you will see a 4-page microsite, packed with great content wrapped in an elegant design. Not only is this microsite great just all by itself, but also it is to be the foundation for when The Zen Den introduces product for sale in the near future.

Don’t setup an F-Commerce Store or Promotional App with Annoying Bulky Scrollbars: Whether it’s a traditional website or Facebook itself, the main bulky scrollbar that you see on the right side of your web browser is more then enough. By enabling the same bulky scrollbar on your iFrame-driven F-Commerce store or other apps is just plain tacky. To be clear, we’re not talking about those cool content boxes on websites with thin, inline jQuery scrollers (some cool examples this can be found at, SloDive)… we’re talking about the examples where it looks like there is an entire website floating around (left-to-right and up-and-down) within the same iFrame on a Facebook page. It is much more appealing and engaging to the user, if the F-Commerce store uses a scroll-free inner environment. Simply using categories and elegant navigation within their Facebook store to escort users through their products, as opposed to just loading up a website through a swishy, bulky iFrame and calling it an F-Commerce store.

An example of an F-Commerce store that does an outstanding job of staying far away from the bulky scrollbars and uses elegant navigation is Express. Express clothing has a very extensive, well-developed F-Commerce store. Although this is an example of an extremely costly, complex and custom solution… Fanpage Toolkit offers a very simple and robust solution, which delivers elegance to the F-Commerce store for as little as no cost. That’s right… FREE!

An unfortunate example of a Facebook page that uses the infamous bulky scrollbar is Oh So Celeb, an Australian shop that sells fashions as seen on celebrities. This shop uses a “dump style” set up, where they place their items in no specific order or category with “Buy Now” buttons under each item. To boot, their solution also uses a bulky scrollbar within their F-Commerce store for navigation, offering an overall non-friendly way to sell items on Facebook.

Don’t setup an F-Commerce Store that redirects Facebook users outside of Facebook: The whole purpose of F-Commerce is to sell your wares within the Facebook ecosystem, while having a 100% Facebook experience. If your F-Commerce shop redirects the buyer to an out-of-Facebook merchant store upon clicking the “Buy Now” button, then they are not using F-Commerce to its full potential. This is called “product redirection”, which is when clicking on an item within an F-Commerce store redirects the user to the to the same item on the merchants 3^rd-party website to complete the transaction process.

Not to pick on the Facebook page of Oh So Celeb too much, but they are a perfect example of using product redirection in their F-Commerce store. If you go to their F-Commerce store and click on the “Buy Now” button, it redirects you over to the identical item on their 3^rd-party E-Commerce website. The only thing worse than using product redirection in your F-Commerce, is using product redirection that doesn’t work or link properly. Imagine making that decision to purchase a Facebook merchants product and then clicking on the “Buy Now” button to only be lead to a website displaying the error, “The Page Cannot Be Found”. Talk about frustrating! An example of this problem is a Facebook page we spoke of earlier of called, GoYerbaMate.com. Their Facebook page has “Buy Now” buttons on products that fail to link properly, only generating the infamous “The Page Cannot Be Found” error.

Now, after all these examples of do’s and don’ts you are probably thinking…. How am I suppose to make my F-Commerce store better while staying on a tight budget? For starters, you have the power to respond and be the best customer service to all your fans everyday, for free. The power and will to respond to all comments and questions is in your hands, and it makes a HUGE difference in the eyes of the customer.

For the ultimate tools of the trade that are both economical and easy to use… let Fanpage Toolkit guide you. Fanpage Toolkit offers Promotions, Sweepstakes, POS Coupon Code Generators, Digital Downloads, F-Commerce Store Builders, Messaging, Analytics and much, much more. So no matter what your needs are you always have a plethora of options for marketing your organization and selling products.

Besides a suite of social marketing solutions, Fanpage Toolkit provides you with many semi-custom template options for your F-Commerce store (with NO annoying scrollbars) and offers one-click sync technology, which allows merchants to link up product catalogs to eBay Stores and the Magento Platform securely and in real-time. No need for out-of-Facebook product linking or page errors, because all transactions are 100% completed within the Facebook ecosystem. Even product catalog inventories and shipping are all updated in real-time to Fanpage Toolkit supported 3^rd-party E-Commerce platforms. This is social commerce and marketing innovation at its best! Fanpage Toolkit offers all the applications and tools needed to set up the most integrated and user-friendly Facebook pages, all under one social commerce and marketing platform. The good news doesn’t stop there though… Fanpage Toolkit offers packages ranging from totally FREE to just $25 per month for everything including the kitchen sink (joking about the kitchen sink part J). Fanpage Toolkit is your #1 Social Commerce and Marketing Platform for Facebook. So ring in the New Year right and get your F-Commerce store up and running for FREE!

Original post by: Fanpage Toolkit

Mark Zuckerberg, the Founder and CEO of Facebook said last August, when Facebook launched its Places mobile-location service, “If I had to guess, social commerce is the next area to really blow up.” Do you think Zuckerberg was right? Let’s take a closer look…

Social commerce is the latest way to sell online, taking advantage of the power of social networks, and the popularity of online commerce. In this sense, social commerce enabled stores can capitalize on one’s social network activity. For example, using Facebook to inform fans about “Facebook Only” sales, promotions and other engaging commerce opportunities, both buyers and sellers win. Since Facebook both holds the highest social network market share award (currently sitting at nearly 900 million active users) and provides the most commerce-friendly tools, it is no wonder every major brand and retailer has setup shop. Not to mention, everyone from SOHO’s, SMB’s, non-profits, artists, students, job seekers and more are utilizing the commerce ecosystems that social networks like Facebook offer. So, whether one is trying to bring their eBay store into Facebook, sell some vintage clothing on a business page or even sell themselves to an potential employer, social commerce is a lot more then just installing a “shop now” tab on your Facebook page.

What Fanpage Toolkit has done to innovate upon this new era of social commerce, is to bring two worlds together as one. They have built both a social commerce and marketing platform together, from the ground up. Therefore, what you get is an incredibly vast set of applications and tools that are seamlessly integrated together. The result has put true commerce and marketing power into the hands of its users.

To accomplish this, Fanpage Toolkit has merged the ever-so-popular Facebook with commerce, to create F-Commerce. F-Commerce takes one’s existing online store or allows for a new one to be created. Once setup under the Fanpage Toolkit platform, the new “social store” is then published to the users Facebook page. Facebook users are now able to shop and complete their transactions without having to leave the Facebook ecosystem (a critical function required to maintain a great user experience). Not to mention, the idea of getting products to find people is what F-Commerce is all about. Facebook’s social plugins allow for this, while innovative social shopping applications like Fanpage Toolkit’s up and coming merchant rewards program, takes the game to a whole new level.

Equally important to the commerce component, and what gets all the critical traction and sales that store owners’ love is marketing. Fanpage Toolkit recognized the importance of having both marketing and commerce as one, back in 2009 when the first retail transaction took place on Facebook via 1800-Flowers. It was then, a couple of geeks having lunch at The Cheesecake Factory agreed that if you’re going to build a social commerce platform for Facebook, you should just do it right and build-in an integrated marketing platform from the ground up. The result is sophisticated set of marketing applications and tools that allow users to build high-impact micro-website pages, market products and services, create and manage promotions, engage Facebook fans and 3^rd-party contacts with full messaging and collaboration tools. All complete with a visualization dashboard and full analytics to manage and trend it all. It’s like having a promotional vehicle for the viral growth of any brand at your fingertips.

Now that you read through the few paragraphs above to get the social commerce guru in you inspired, here is the magical question… Do you think that you know everything that there is to know about social commerce? No matter if your answer is yes, no, or maybe… it’s time to Download this FREE white paper on, “Everything You Need to Know About Social Commerce” [The ins and outs to selling and marketing on Facebook]. The truth is, social commerce is only going to continue to grow. So, do yourself a favor, stay on top of the trend, feed your noggin, and DOWNLOAD this FREE resource today!

Original Post By: Kelly Clayton at Fanpage Toolkit

By: Chris Richards, via – Fanpage Toolkit

Social Commerce is Young, But Primed for Growth

Introduced in 2007, the notion of social commerce, or an online storefront fueled by social networks, is still relatively new to the social media landscape. In fact, one would be hard pressed to find an average Facebook user who has completed a commercial transaction within the constraints of Facebook itself. Though, with Facebook users spending 700 billion minutes per month engaging within the platform, the potential value for brands that are able to drive transactions within Facebook’s environment is huge.

As it stands, social commerce, or more specifically, “f-commerce,” can be divided into four categories:

• On-site selling facilitated by Facebook plugins
• Selling initiated on Facebook
• Selling completed on Facebook
• Selling through iFrames and Facebook apps

On-site selling facilitated by Facebook likes and shares has been common practice among traditional commerce sites seeking to “socialize” their buying process. Scalable e-commerce platforms like Magento and Zen Cart function well as standalone website marketplaces, though, companies using them often lack the social integration that could drive sales to the next level.  The growth of e-commerce platforms, like Magento, is showing little sign of slowing, and by the end of 2010, they were found to be serving over 80,000+ active stores across the Internet.

eBay’s market place service is the largest e-commerce platform available to customers. With an overall user base of 100 million, it is estimated that 10% of eBay users are also marketplace subscribers[3]. The good news behind those numbers? Overall eBay marketplace revenue was up 11%.  Within marketplaces the GMV growth rates as of April 2011 were:

• Overall GMV – 8% y/y
• US GMV – 10% y/y
• International GMV – 6%

When looking at the US, eBay’s GMV growth rate came pretty much in-line with e-commerce for the first time in years.[4]

Facebook store apps and basic storefronts that utilize the built in iFrames feature have been successfully integrated into some large fan pages through tools like BigCommerce, Storefront Social, and Payvment. More basically, companies have found success creating unique photo albums to display their products in a more natural light, and as a way to meet consumer demand for ways to share products and buying experiences with their friends across social networks. Essentially, without one, unified, system of social sharing across ecommerce platforms, the trend has been slow to catch on and keep up with other more popular types of social media interaction.

[4] http://ebaystrategies.blogs.com/ebay_strategies/2011/04/digging-into-ebays-q1-2011-results.html

Finally, according to current trends, where companies stand to gain the most is through commerce transacted completely within Facebook. All other social commerce options drive users away from the comfortable and unified environment of Facebook. The small disconnect between making users open a new tab or travel to a new site can mean the difference between making or losing a sale. The impact of a tool that could fully integrate the buying process into Facebook would be enormous, as a recent study by JWT found that 48% of Facebook users between the ages of 20-33 would like to see an option to buy products directly on Facebook.

With this in mind, a tool that could successfully integrate the social commerce transaction process directly into Facebook could see great success. The newly released Fanpage Toolkit will do just that. It promises to empower users to create, promote, market and sell their products and services completely within the Facebook ecosystem. The platform provides all the essential tools that businesses, brands, organizations/non-profits, artists, bands and public figures, as well as individual users, need to create and manage their own high-impact Facebook page environments completely within the Facebook ecosystem.

The Competitive Landscape

The creation of a storefront within Facebook does not alone equate to social commerce. Just as one’s personal experience shopping in a traditional store is defined by more than simply picking up items and buying them, social commerce is comprised of many different integrated elements, that when working together, can create a meaningful and fun experience for customers. In order to provide this experience, companies marketing themselves across the Facebook environment need a tool that incorporates all the facets of social commerce into one easy to use platform.

Currently, there are only a few solid page development and commerce solutions for Facebook available in the market today. On the page development side, these include companies such as… North Social, Buddy Media, Wildfire, Lujure, FanPageEngine, Pagemodo, and TabSite. On the commerce solutions side, these include companies such as, TabJuice, Volusion, Voiyk, Storefront Social, BigCommerce, Payvment and ShopTab. All of which only offer only a part of the solution to today’s problem of creating “both” Facebook Pages and Selling Products on Facebook (which is needed for true Social Commerce). A true Social Commerce solution must have the renforcement of promotional marketing, analytical and customer management tools… all wrapped around an online storefront. Oh and btw… all of this needs to be fully integrated and affordable to not just the Fortune 5000, but the SOHO’s and SMB’s too!

The currently available solutions today provide only generic html/iframe templates or a single application solution “only”, with little or no integration. Or they attempt to up-sell the customer to a costly, custom development package costing anywhere from thousands to tens-of-thousands of dollars or more, with little or no management tools or integration. Fanpage Toolkit’s Social Commerce and Marketing Platform is a product array of application solutions, offering much more than just templates and a single application solution. Fanpage Toolkit offers, a Complete Solution to Social Commerce for Everyone!

Currently, competing products offer the ability to integrate data feeds and CSV store file imports into a Facebook store environment, completely neglecting the ability to share data between the popular Magento, eBay, Shopify and ZenCart store interfaces. In fact, outside of Fanpage Toolkit… only Payvment and Tabjuice offer the ability to complete transactions within Facebook’s ecosystem. Social commerce integration aside, what about other apps that complete the social commerce experience for a customer?

What tool integrates apps for custom page building, sweepstakes and promotions, messaging, or analytics? None! No single service on the market integrates all the apps for a complete social commerce experience into one tool, except Fanpage Toolkit.

Table 2: Brief Feature Comparison

In order to achieve the best results, social commerce campaigns must not only reach their audience in a variety of ways, but campaigns must be easy for companies and individual users to manage. With Fanpage Toolkit, creating, updating, and analyzing a social commerce campaign has never been more powerful or intuitive.

The Solution to the Chaos: Fanpage Toolkit

With an abundance of third party apps and programs, users have been able to piece together social commerce campaigns with varying degrees of success. In order to make sense of the chaos, a unified solution is necessary, and, if value comes from integration of services, Fanpage Toolkit is packed to the brim with potential.

Most attractively, Fanpage Toolkit provides all of the tools and back-office resources necessary to guide the subscriber step by-step with little effort and full system automation through the implementation of a highly personalized presence in the Facebook ecosystem. Included in the package are pre-built and semi-custom industry specific template-based page environments, which are built and maintained to Facebook’s specification for pages. All Fanpage Toolkit subscribers will have the ability to market their products/services, create/manage promotions, manage customer customers/leads, create/manage in-Facebook stores and have a visualization dashboard with full analytics. Facebook Page Builder, Promotions and the F-Commerce application sets are wizard driven systems that within a few clicks of the user will implement a highly customized presence on Facebook. Using onscreen real-time editors, publishing to Facebook is automated and is as simple as clicking your mouse.

Fanpage Toolkit also offers its subscribers an F-Commerce add-on, which allows the user to create a full-featured shopping cart system within Facebook, including PayPal and Authorize.Net merchant processing support.

What pushes Fanpage Toolkit even further ahead of the competition, though, is its extensive support for 3^rd-party e-commerce platforms. Only in Fanpage Toolkit can page owners fully integrate a Magento and eBay storefront, featuring one-click sync capability for all store catalog inventories and shipping.

As more social commerce products emerge on the market, it will be important for users to have one trusted name to turn to for an integrated solution. Instead of having to piece together various third party solutions, companies should only have to turn to one resource.

With Fanpage Toolkit, true social commerce will become a reality for businesses, brands, non-profits, artists, individuals and more across the social landscape.

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Via -http://www.fanpagetoolkit.com/blog/2011/09/19/new-feature-facebook-pages-are-automatically-published-to-your-facebook-account/

At the request of many fanpage toolkit subscribers, we have now built-in an auto-publishing feature that “no longer” requires users to manually install our integrated suite of facebook applications to facebook.

Originally, fanpage toolkit subscribers had to click on an “Install fanpage toolkit fanpage/promotions/f-commerce app” link on the Finalize screen, after building their facebook page. This install app link, would then open a new browser tab/window and bring you to a facebook app install page. Here you would select the facebook page that you would want our app install on. Once selected, you would then just need to click on the “Add fanpage toolkit fanpage/promotions/f-commerce” button and your selected facebook page would now be up and running with fanpage toolkit.

Today, the headache of manually installing apps is gone! Now, all you need to do to get any fanpage toolkit app up and running on your facebook page; is build-out your FB Pages, Promotions and f-commerce stores just as before… up until you get the Finalize section of the wizard system. You will now see 2 content fields and a check-box option, followed by the Back and Publish buttons on the bottom-right of the page (see fanpage tookit screenshot below). Next, do the following….

1. First, in the “customize name” content field; enter a friendly name that will make it easy for you to identify this page in the fanpage toolkit application dashboard.
2. Second, in the “tab name” content field; entire the name of this particular application tab. Note… the name you enter here, is the name that will be auto-published to your facebook page tab for which this application represents. Example: if you want to call your f-commerce store application tab, “Shop Now”… you will want to enter that name here.
3. Third, check off the “active/inactive” checkbox to activate this application for publishing to facebook.
4. Finally, click the “Publish” button on the bottom-right of the page, to have this application auto-published to your facebook page. You will know that your page published successfully, when you get the green notification  stating “fanpage has been updated successfully“.

Note… the tutorial videos for FB Pages, Promotions and f-commerce stores are still showing the manual publishing method. These videos will be revised and uploaded in the near future, so please be patient. However, help content in the fanpage toolkit Help Center will be kept up to date as new features are added and changes to existing applications are made.

We hope this update and short tutorial has been helpful. The fanpage toolkit development team is in the process of rolling out some awesome new features and support to existing applications, as well as long-awaited support to 3rd-party e-commerce systems (allowing our subscribers to perform a one-click sync to place their traditional e-commerce store products on facebook).

These next several months are indeed very exciting for all of us… so, stay tuned for more details as time grows near!

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Via -http://www.fanpagetoolkit.com/blog/2011/09/12/why-fanpage-toolkit-needs-to-sync-your-facebook-profile-data-during-subscription-sign-up/

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Via -http://www.fanpagetoolkit.com/blog/2011/08/24/facebook-launches-ad-targeting-by-topic/

Original Post By: Josh Constine - Via: Inside Facebook on August 23, 2011.

Facebook recently added the ability to target advertisements by Topic, as detailed in its new Interests Targeting guide (.PDF). Rather than targeting users that Like a specific Page, advertisers can simultaneously target all users who Like any variation of a word or phrase. For example, rather than just targeting fans of Lady Gaga, by selecting the #Lady Gaga Topic, an ad will also be shown to fans of any unofficial Pages for the musician, such as “I ♥ Lady Gaga”.

The new targeting option, available in both the self-serve ads tool and the Ads API, will help advertisers expand the reach of their ads to more relevant users. It will be especially handy for less experienced advertisers who might not know to explicitly target keywords related an interest of their customers.

Topic targeting joins Facebook’s two other interest targeting options: the original, default Precise Interest targeting for advertising to fans of a specific Page; and the relatively new Broad Category targeting for advertising to wide ranges of users with similar profile characteristics such as newlyweds, or Likes of any Page related to large category such as football.

Advertisers employing Precise Interest Targeting can miss out on showing their ads to relevant people because Facebook users sometimes Like related or unofficial versions of Pages rather than the official version owned by the company or celebrity the Pages represent. These users might be willing to click through ads and make purchases, so missing them through Precise Interest targeting hurts ad performance.

With the new Topic targeting option, when advertisers type in a keyword to target in the Precise Interest targeting section of the self-serve ad tool, the typeahead will now bring up Topics denoted with a hash (#) tag in addition to specific Pages. Advertisers can select these #topics to include anyone who Likes official, related, or unofficial Pages associated with that Topic.

Topics also now appear as targeting suggestions. This means if an advertisers targets Lady Gaga as a Precise Interest, Facebook will show suggestions to also target the #Lady Gaga topic to reach additional users. These suggestions might also include additional pop music singer Precise Interests such as Katy Perry or Beyoncé, and Topics such as #Beyoncé Knowles.

Topic Targeting Strategies

Advertisers using keyword targeting should consider simultaneously running Precise Interest targeted ads and Topic targeted ads as separate campaigns, as this will allow them to determine how effective Topic targeting is. Targeting multiple topics within the same campaign may make it difficult to refine targeting to the best responding demographics, so advertisers should consider running ads for different Topics in different campaigns.

Those targeting a variety of specific keywords should think about which are the most relevant to their customers and try also targeting the corresponding Topics. Targeting too many Topics may dilute ad spend. There may be a higher probability that fans of unofficial Pages encompassed by Topic targeting are less savvy Facebook users than those that are fans of official Pages. Therefore, advertisers pitching more sophisticated products and services may receive more unqualified clicks by targeting Topics.

Less experienced advertisers, those with smaller budgets, and those with less time time to spend managing ads have a lot to gain from Topic targeting, as reduces the need to identify a wide range of individual but related keywords. Advanced advertisers using the Ads API tools and services should consider adding Topic targeting into their A/B tests to determine when Topic targeting can improve ad performance for their specific business.

With Topic targeting and the recently launched zip code targeting, Facebook is significantly increasing the ways advertisers can reach potential customers on Facebook. By providing an easier experience for novice advertisers and opening new strategies for veterans, Facebook may be able to ride these new feature launches into increased advertising revenue.