brand-e

More than two thirds of UK consumers believe social media is a better way to communicate with brands than through call centres, while 40% think it improves customer service (compared to a mere 7% who fear social media will damage service), according to a study from Fishburn Hedges and Echo Research. In addition, 36% of consumers have already interacted with companies via social media, almost double the proportion of just eight months ago.

Leo Burnett/Arc Worldwide researchers have identified six online shopper archetypes for the agency’s SocialShop study. For one, the Savvy Passionista is a heavy social shopper using social media channels to broadcast the latest trends and stay connected with favourite brands. Savvy Passionistas use social channels to express feelings and stay relevant and in-the-know. To reach them, brands should help shoppers discover, express and connect on emerging and established platforms.

More than 40% of Americans use social media to shop – the equivalent of some 95 million social shoppers – and that number continues to rise. In fact, when asked how often social media is used to shop today compared to one year ago, almost three-quarters of respondents to the Leo Burnett/Arc Worldwide SocialShop study confirmed they are using it more frequently.

If Facebook were a country it would boast the third-largest population in the world, behind only China and India, while the Social Network has more members than there are people in Europe, according to SocialBakers. In addition, the Coca-Cola brand alone has nearly 100 million more fans on Facebook than there are residents of the US. And brands Starbucks, Converse, Red Bull and Oreo each have nearly five times the number of fans on Facebook than there are people in the UK.

L’Occitane is the best-performing luxury brand in the digital space in both Brazil and Russia, according to L2’s Digital IQ Index: Brazil, Russia, India report. L’Occitane’s Brazilian Facebook page reached 100,000-fan milestone in January with a hand-cream giveaway pushing up metrics – the brand managed to rack up 40,000 fans in a 12-day period

Nestlé and JWT have launched the Social Break app for KitKat, the ‘Have a break, have a KitKat’ brand. The marketing application enables users to hand over the business of updating posts to social networks for a while so that they can reduce the pressure they feel of having to be so active on social media channels.