Altimeter Group has released a new report titled Rise of Social Commerce – A Trail Guide for the Social Commerce Pioneer which discusses the use of Social Technologies to connect, listen, understand and engage to improve the shopping experience. The report provides a four-stage process to assess where companies are at and the path forward.

• Let’s Be Social: Programs are launched to drive brand advocacy and increase volume/market share.
• Enlightened Engagement: Companies create interconnections of e-commerce and social platforms – both owned and in the wider web – to influence influencers, improve decision-making, and distill the voice of the customer for the enterprise.
• Store of the Community: Fans drive assortment, selection, and services through open innovation networks and social networks.
• Frictionless Commerce: Companies redesign the shopping experience across channels and categories, to create a truly customer-centric shopping experience.

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Meet the new shopper. Underneath the keys of the keyboard, they are shopping in a new way. Unleashing the power of the social network, the digital consumer is shopping with friends, sharing recommendations, and actively engaging in dialogue with brand owners on how they want to be served. But, can you listen? Can you serve the new shopper? Or are you so busy YELLING your brand message, that you will miss this opportunity to listen, engage and serve the consumer in new ways? With the rise of social commerce, you have new opportunities to anticipate, personalize and energize the shopping experience; but our finished research report documents that the biggest barriers are enterprise processes that are designed to broad-brush markets, push big-brand messages, and serve markets through conventional channels.