Here are some interesting points from Sameer Samat (Google product management director) presented in Social Commerce Summit 2010.
1- He announced the new feature of google which under a new partnership between Google and Bazaarvoice, retailers and manufacturers can display their online product reviews and ratings within their AdWords ad campaigns – as well as have them appear in product searches on Google.com. The feature is ready for product list and google is in final stage of testing the adWords part of it. I think this will give more control to consumers.
You can read more details here:
2- He shared some interesting statistics which makes it very clear why for businesses being online is very important? Why social media channels are important and on top of that why Mobile should be the center of attention. The numbers speak for themselves; just put them together and you see where the trend is going!
a. 45% of offline sales has been influenced (somehow) from online research
b. In one minute:
i. 24 hours of content uploaded to Youtube
ii. 270,000 words are written on blogger (this is equivalent to 388M word a day!!)
c. There are 4bn+ mobile phone subscribers all over the world
d. Smartphone sales will eclipse PC sales by 2012 (some people believe that it is already happening in most part of the world!)
e. One in Five (1/5) shoppers said they intend to use their Mobile to shop during 2009 Holliday season.
f. Some businesses are trying to make offline and online shopping experience very similar using different innovative ways, for example printing the online reviews and putting them in front of the product in store.
g. Study shows that most Young people (under 14) start their shopping from YouTube!!! Why? I guess because they want to see (visually) how the product works and what kind of cool stuff one can do with it!
/Hossein