Happy Monday morning!
Today’s Curio includes:
🧠 Likeability and influence go hand in hand. [Consumer Insight]
🤖 Social commerce is coming of age. [Digital Trend]
👩🔬 Why people opt-in for mobile notifications. [Market Research]
💡 How a grocery chain is attracting new customers through Facebook Live. [Case Study]
🧠 Likability and influence go hand in hand.
We like to be consistent with how we look and what we associate with because there’s a social cost to being inconsistent.
At the very least, we want others to see that our behaviour is consistent with our beliefs and attitudes.
It tells the world that we aren’t flaky.
And that we have our sh*t together.
But it’s more than just the optics.
Wearing an Apple Watch, drinking Starbucks, and driving a Tesla also helps reinforce how we see ourselves.
And psychologists believe that maintaining a consistent and positive self-impression may be more important than impressing others.
And that’s why lifestyle brands have such control over us.
Lifestyle brands help us share our true selves with the world.
They help us present a consistent self-image (building social trust) and help others like us (building social influence).
By following famous influencers on IG, retweeting Simon Sinek, or posting a selfie with a conference pass to Slush, you’re telling others to like you because you like the things they like.
And that’s why everyone wants to become a lifestyle brand.
And why becoming one takes more than imitating one.
You become a lifestyle brand when enough people can express themselves through you.
That’s a tall order.
Lifestyle brands have such power over us because they:
Build a consistent social personality (they’re not flaky), and
Build social influence by becoming a source of self-expression for millions of people who can express their quirks, preferences, and interest by association.
🤖 Social commerce is coming of age.
Since the start of the pandemic social commerce has grown 3x faster than traditional ecommerce.
And according to Accenture, 52% of millennials and 48% of Gen-Z get inspiration from their favourite influencers when shopping online.
Up until now, if you were an influencer running an affiliate marketing business, the only way you could turn engagement into revenue was through tools like Linktree.
But this past holiday season, IG tested out an in-app affiliate program that allows selected influencers to create a curated shop on their profile.
Over 100 brands and retailers participated in the trial where influencers can earn a commission for every product click and check-outs on Instagram.
If successful, IG’s affiliate marketing pilot can speed up similar features from other apps like TikTok (which is already a powerhouse for Amazon affiliate marketers).
More options for the creators means new expectations for brand marketing on social media.
👩🔬 People don’t opt-in for mobile notifications for receiving discounts.
I’m not surprised. I didn’t even opt-in to get notifications from LinkedIn, which I use more than Whatsapp most days.
Do you send brand comms through your app? And do you worry about in-app engagement? Or is that something your IT department takes care of…
💡 A regional grocery chain from Texas is using Facebook live to reach new audiences.
HEB, a regional chain of grocery stores, launched a cooking series on Facebook Live last year.
The series features local chefs and allows viewers to purchase everything the chef uses - down to the pans and pots. One of their most famous classes pulled in nearly half a million views.
Not too shabby.
Unfortunately, I didn’t find any figures on ROI. Still, it’s a great example of how social commerce isn’t limited to cosmetics.
Have a great week ahead!
Aliyar