Facebook users are a lot more social online. All together, now: Duh. But the amount and the way they interact may surprise you. According to All Facebook, consumers who are on Facebook and browsing e-commerce sites simultaneously are nine times as likely to connect through those sites’ social features and share the content with friends.
Considering how many people are on Facebook, this is great news. It demands retailers put a little thought into how their consumers can use social tools on their sites to interact. But before we pull out our pom-poms and let loose a yelp of joy, we should pause to consider this number.
The article cited a Social Labs study that looked at 1.35 million clicks across 42 social sharing apps between October 2010 and January 2012. It classified consumers as Facebook users if they used “log in with Facebook” buttons or shared information from their Facebook accounts. It compared the numbers of sharing with users who did not share anything from Facebook.
If Facebook consumers really did share nine times more than other consumers, they would be worth a lot of focused efforts. But as the comments to the article reveal, these numbers parade in with a few questions dangling off their feet.
What about all the consumers who have Facebook accounts but don’t use them to connect with social sites? It may that these consumers just have a case of the online-sharing willies. And what kinds of sharing do these numbers reflect; is it actually valuable interaction, or something simple?
Either way, the concept of high sharers and low sharers warrants attention from at least a few brain cells. Whether the numbers really reflect all Facebook users or just high-sharing Facebook consumers, it behooves all online retailers to think about the way social interaction is presented and encouraged on their sites.
Read the full article at allfacebook.com.
