Social Shopping is the New Social Networking

Much to the knowledge of the common man, shopping has been one of the best excuses to socialize. This very relaxing activity has been the stress busting option for most of us. Although, since the advent of social networking, people have started interacting and expressing much more digitally, especially when the interaction crosses nation, community, religion, race and so on. It has brought many people in different parts of the globe together and the objective of social networking has been successfully established in the current society. However, another arena that is not entirely untouched but commercially unexplored is social shopping. The mode of shopping through user-based websites offering resourceful insights and recommendations on various products and service is a fad that is currently and rapidly catching on amongst the average internet user.

While Google is for search, Facebook is for Social Networking, Youtube is for Videos an authoritative site is yet to find its identity for social shopping. However, there is no denying that social shopping sites like Groupon are gaining high revenue turnover, that may soon exceed than that received by Google. People are doing nothing much different in social shopping sites than what they did in social networking sites. However, the major difference is social networking sites offered a marketing platform to gain audience, social shopping sites directly aims at getting prospective customers and thus generating quick revenue streams. The best part in social shopping unlike in social networking sites although is that the marketing and promotion process is done by the average user of the product. They communicate, aggregate, post pictures and videos and gather all the required info about the product, prices and deals and offer it to fellow social shoppers. Hence, it is evidently gathering increasing impetus amongst online shoppers.

It is thus safe to say, that social shopping is the futuristic face of internet marketing for smart customers who like to hear about discounts and deals, product credibility and probably just plain conversation and socializing from customers of their own caliber. The one sharing the information on social shopping sites like these does not go empty handed either. They earn credits and may win vouchers or even hard cash. So, this here seems like a great tool to strategically market your products. Product promotion platforms may change but opportunities never cease to come by. Earn customer loyalty and sales through e-commerce store online. The very fact that 78% of consumers trust peer recommendations, while the rest of the 14% go for advertisements helps us foresee online marketing trends.