Talking Point
The talking point in this case is using Facebook for business. As a case study for Facebook use for business I’d like to present Snowboard Clearance. Snowboard Clearance is an online snowboard store which launched in November 2008 solely via Facebook. In the 8 months of its existence it has built a solid and active fan base with a higher conversion rate than most mail-outs and we are only half way through its first winter! There are a few notable factors to this November 2008 launch:
- It was in Summer
- It is only an online store
- It was only promoted through Facebook
- And their market is limited to Australia (due to freight issues).
The strategy we have used for Snowboard Clearance is definitely not limited to snowboarding (or other extreme sports), as I hope becomes clear in the following brief review.
Building a Facebook fan page was a primary objective for SC (Snowboard Clearance). It provided an interactive forum to engage with Snowboarders around the country, to answer their questions, provide information and advice on snowboards and other gear and find out what they want from such a business. The interaction that has taken place since November has built trust in the brand and a certain amount of LOVE. Enough love infact, that two SC Facebook fans got the SC logo tattooed (and they were given a snowboard in return!). Naturally this was captured on video, uploaded to YouTube and placed on the front page of the website and on the Facebook page.
The Facebook framework allows the creation of custom pages. This is done through applications such as Facebook’s FBML. For Snowboard Clearance we have used this application to promote competitions, special offers, new additions and the ability for our fans to check the current snow cams for all the major Australian snowfields in the one page.
In eight months Snowboard Clearance has built a fan base of 1,520. To add substance to this number, let’s look at the market that was targeted to build this fan base. In November 2008 SC commenced a series of Facebook ad campaigns. The Facebook advertisement builder allows a business to target specific age groups, locations, and other things, including words and phrases that people have in their profiles. The Facebook audience SC targeted via advertisements (snowboarders, extreme sports) in Nov 08 was only 23,000. SC’s 1,520 fans is about 6.5% of this group. And of this fan base SC have converted 3.2% to sales, each sale of at least $175. Keep in mind that Snowboard Clearance DID NOT EXIST prior to its launch on Facebook. So for a new brand, in its off season, this is a great result and offers a fantastic platform to build on for the years to come. Snowboard Clearance understand that Social Media is here to stay and how critical it is for their business to be involved.
The integration of social media into the e-commerce website for Snowboard Clearance is clearly apparent on first view of the homepage. We have added a Facebook badge inviting visitors that did not originate from Facebook (Google search results or other direct referrals) to ‘follow us”. As mentioned earlier the YouTube video has been embedded into the front page which makes it smoothly deliverable on the SC website, as well as being searchable on both YouTube and Google.
Shortly before this article was written, Facebook introduced the ability to add a fan box to your website. SC immediately took this opportunity and added a fan box to a facebook feed page within their ecommerce site. The major benefit we see of this is to give instant social proof of the activity of their fan base as well as enabling new visitors to fan the page directly without leaving the main website.
Think Social expects a huge leap in the fan base over the next two weeks with a Facebook promotion that is currently under way. This promotion is part of a social media strategy that was created to fulfil the objectives of the Snowboard Clearance business plan. Whilst these objectives may become apparent to the observer as they take place, we cannot disclose these strategic moves, as they are confidential.
Due to the advanced targeting available in Facebook’s advertising, there are many markets that can be successfully targeted. Think Social can do a preliminary search to give you some examples of prospect pools in your target market to confirm that there is an opportunity for your business. This service can be requested independent of the service models, or as part of a social media strategy. Use the contact form so one of our consultants can get in touch with you about your business objectives.
It is worth noting that whilst there are a lot more Social Media channels available, in November 2008 Facebook was deemed to be the most suitable. Discussions are under way to build on this strategy with other channels in the near future.
LF
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