TwelpForce. People power. Consumer-driven innovation. The “conversation”. Gen Buy. Lobster tails. These are just a few of the core concepts (and choice food items) that gave conference attendees something to talk about at this year’s Shop.org Annual Summit.

Cheers to all who stopped by our booth. Visitors were certainly not afraid to let their “Social” hang out. If you were asked the question “What’s Your Social?”, and got a chance to put a sharpie to a slick-looking button to write down your response, then you kindly shared interesting and unique ways in which you connect with your friends and customers through social media.

What’s Your Social? not only compelled visitors by getting them to think about the fundamental shift in the way we now communicate in our personal relationships, but it also got them to explore creative and new ways in which to build deeper relationships with their customers. It was not an uncommon sight to see button wearers turn and squint to read each others’ buttons in the booth to ask, “Hey, so what’s your Social?” Among some of the interesting responses (and there were many), a personal favorite was “Salsa Dancing and Fine Wine.” View more of our favorites here:

For us, the Shop.Org Annual Summit is about connecting with existing clients and friends, and building new relationships. There is nothing more valuable than getting a chance to see everyone face to face, and putting that smile to the email, or that handshake to the voice on the phone–then continuing to build our relationships through the power of community networks and Social.

Here’s to incisive, eye-opening keynote presentations and panel discussions, “Social” button-wearers, popcorn noshers, and free morning lattes courtesy of Venda to shake off those late Vegas nights (we hear ya).

Most importantly, a special thanks to all the folks who attended this year’s event. Hope to see you next year!

We are very pleased to be recognized by Internet Retailer as the Solution Leader in the Customer Reviews and Forums category – click here for the full article (screen shot from their email announcement below).

We founded PowerReviews four years ago based on a revolutionary idea that not only are reviews useful to consumers at the end of the shopping process (validating their purchase decision), reviews done a certain way – using structured (tag-based) content – can fuel a personalization and social commerce revolution.  For example, using our 3rd Generation Tag-based review technology, Brands like Jelly Belly and retailers like REI are able to present meaningful at-a-glance review summaries to help shoppers in the middle of the shopping process quickly compare products.

Review Snapshot® – REI HalfDome Tent

In addition, using our 3G tag-based review engine, PowerReviews empowers customers of retailers like Dicks Sporting Goods and Kiddicare at the start of the shopping process with the ability to narrow product selection based on Social attributes like Uses and Pros.  For instance, finding baby strollers recommended for Newborns when you Travel a lot.

Social Navigation – Kiddicare Strollers

We believe that tag-based reviews, and social media in general, have empowered consumers to make significantly more confident purchased decision with social advice at every step in the buying process.  Buying online is still riskier than buying in a store.  But with social recommendations early in the process and social feedback late in the process, consumers are making far fewer purchase mistakes when taking that risk.

I’d like to thank our customers who are driving this revolution so that their customers (and them as a result) fully reap these sizeable benefits!

Full full listing of Internet Retailer Top 500 Awards click here.

Interestingly, the debate isn’t quite so black-and-white when it comes to applying Social Media to eCommerce.  The main question we get from our clients is not “Should we get involved with Social Media?”, but “How can we use Social Media to Increase Sales in a Measurable Way?”.  The answer to most of our clients is “You already ARE!”…through the use of reviews and Q&A (and combined with our In-line SEO solution and recently introduced Facebook/Twitter widgets).

Of course, that’s just putting a new name on old tricks…the NEW strategies that are emerging for eCommerce companies to engage in Social Commerce I believe will come in 3 primary flavors:

1)  User Generated Content will evolve into Social Recommendations.

The debate over the mechanical aspects of UGC (moderation, SEO, etc) is quickly falling into the background — meaning that, most mature websites will have some sort of reviews and/or q&a content, and that content will be well managed by an outside vendor or otherwise.  However, the process and technology of utilizing that content to guide other customers toward a better purchase decision (i.e. a Social Recommendation) is still an emerging frontier with tremendous opportunity.   Instead of competing for the “largest selection” or “lowest price”, I believe that Websites will eventually compete to have the “smartest customers” whom other shoppers can trust.

2)  Brick & Mortar experiences will include Social Recommendations.

Not overnight, since there’s some change in consumer behavior required, but it will become pervasive .  Whether it’s on product packaging, store signage or mobile devices,  Customers will insist on easy access to recommendations and feedback from their peers (and specifically peers “like them”) to supplement the assistance of a sales associate.  Let’s face it, no matter how experienced a sales associate is, he/she can’t know the collective experience of all their customers using each product.

3)  Social Media will be the Brand-Building tool of choice.

No matter how hard your PR or marketing works, because everyday people can talk about your brand with a high level of authenticity and trust, your advocates and detractors will continue to hold the largest sway on how other customers perceive your brand.  Figuring out how to amplify the opinions of your advocates and enabling them to recruit new users is a major opportunity.  The challenge of this effort is to execute a strategy in a credible, transparent manner.  For examples of what NOT to do, read about the Belkin’s fake reviews fiasco (if you haven’t already) or about Murphy-Goode Wines backfired video contest.

At PowerReviews, we are certainly working hard to experiment and find solutions that take advantage of these upcoming trends…mainly as extensions of our Reviews and AnswerBox solutions.  There are also several other innovators that are taking a different approach.  The first is LiveClicker, that is amplifying the power of recommendations through video.  Look at OnlineShoes.tv as a great example of ecommerce-enabling UGC.  Another is Ripple6 (see MomsLikeMe.com) that works with big publisher sites to identify and nurture brand advocates by offering robust community tools.

No matter what the ultimate solutions are, we are excited to be on the forefront of this Social Media groundswell, and I look forward to working with our clients and partners to creating a new vision together.  Oh yeah, I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below!

How It Works
Facebook Connect is integrated directly into the write-a-review process so it’s super easy for users to publish their reviews to Facebook.   In the past, users could post content to Facebook, but only if it was already on your site.  This meant that users had to keep checking back to see when their review was posted on the site.  How many people do you think remembered to do that?  Once it was live, they could then post the product page to Facebook.  Even then, their review may have been one of many on the page.  This posed too many barriers to the user to be an effective marketing tool for you.

With Facebook Connect, users can now post their review to Facebook immediately after they write it, while their excitement about a product is fresh in their mind (and before they forget to do it).

Facebook Connect highlights their specific review content in the post and allows them to add their own comments.

The key is that PowerReviews posts only a “snippet” of the review on Facebook, requiring their friends to click on a link to read the rest of the review – which takes them to your site — and that’s what drives the immediate traffic uplift.

When their friends arrive on your site, the review is highlighted, making it a fulfilling experience once they arrive.

Why Use It
Facebook is the largest social network in the world.  In April 2009, Facebook reported an estimated 200 million monthly active users.  This is a powerful network that you can use to spread the word about your products and your site, driving significant short term and longer term traffic to your site.

During Citysearch’s initial beta testing of Facebook Connect they found:

“In the four months the site has been testing Facebook Connect, 94 percent of reviewers have published their reviews to Facebook, where an average of 40 people see them and 70 percent click back to Citysearch. That has translated into new members: daily registrations on Citysearch have tripled.” New York Times

That’s an average of 40 people seeing a post about your site and 28 people coming to your site for each review posted to Facebook.  Not bad.

If you are interested in using Facebook Connect with Reviews on your site, contact us at info@powerreviews.com.  If you happen to be at the Internet Retailer Conference East in Boston, June 16 and 17, stop by Booth #1036.

What does this mean to a Shopify client?  We took an easy implementation and made it downright simple.  The usual integration process has three steps.  The first step is to upload a product feed.  With Shopify, we pull it directly from the Shopify platform with a click of a button.  The second step is to select the appropriate “write-a-review” forms for the product categories (that’s important because we have product-specific review forms with tags for the “pros”, “cons”, “best uses” and “reviewer profiles” that relate to each category).  Since this is very straightforward, we didn’t need to simply it.  The final step is to put our JavaScript code on their pages in order to display the review content.  With input from their CEO, Tobi Lütke, it was decided that their technically-savvy merchants would have the option to select exactly where to display their customer reviews.

Last, but definitely not least, we are about to launch a fully automated “Follow-Up Email” program with Shopify — automatically sending their clients’ customers an email 3-4 weeks after their purchase asking them to review the product.  Why is this a big deal?  As many of you know, a review solution on its own doesn’t guarantee success.  All of our ROI studies indicate that review volume is the primary driver of sales uplift, and follow-up email drives 95% of that review volume.  (one such ROI study is with Netshops)

So, welcome Shopify merchants to the PowerReviews family!  We are excited to partner with Jaded Pixel to offer you our award-winning review solution for Small and Medium-Sized Retailers fully integrated into your eCommerce Platform.