E-Commerce & Digital Marketing Trends For Tech Companies In 2012

Here's my tips for the big trends we're seeing in e-commerce, digital marketing and social media in technology companies (focused on Asia) in 2012. This is based specifically on what I've learned at Dell (managing their e-commerce sales in the region) and on what I see happening in Asia with other technology companies (such as Lenovo, Apple, HP, IBM, Acer, Blackberry, Nokia, etc.).

Buying and e-commerce is becoming more fragmented (particularly for tech companies corporate e-commerce enabled websites)  – E-Commerce as we know it is in a death spiral. It just doesn't make sense to build an OEM direct e-commerce website like Dell did in the 1990's. E-Commerce will become more fragmented and dominated by eTailers and new types of online buying. It might seem like a strange statement considering the massive move from traditional to digital sales but consider Dell's example. Dell already has a market leading position online in the technology space. In Asia, Dell has the number 1 Online market share via Dell.com. Dell cannot increase this, it can only be eroded and share will be lost over time. It's not all bad news though, because at the same time, eTail revenue is growing exponentially, with players like Lenovo in China growing in triple digital quarter-on-quarter online (and not through Lenovo.com). There is also a rise in Group Buying, such as in Australia where it is now driving over $500m of Group Buying transactions/year. Serious contentors need to have a product and content strategy that is multi-channel across a company's website, eTail, Social Commerce and Mobile. To win in e-commerce tech companies must think of e-commerce as a transaction from ANY platform - not just an e-commerce enabled corporate site. Customers have evolved and their preferences have changed. Tech companies need to adapt and try new things to stay ahead of customer demand.

Simplify and clearly differentiate our offering for specific customer segments – Many tech companies have too many different products and are confusing customers. At the same time, so many tech companies do not have any real product differentiation (in Dell's case, what is an Inspiron vs Latitude? For HP what's the difference for their Compaq vs Envy brands?). Tech companies should take a leaf out of Apple's strategy on simplification. But for true success in 2012 tech leaders will need to both reduce and simplify their product offering and have a specific digital go-to-market plan for identified customer segments. Real winners in this area will  have personalisation programs and social sign-in to truly have a one-on-one customer relationship (while being able to share that relationship with the customer's friends).

Everything is going social – How people communicate and buy technology is becoming fundamentally social. Tech companies need to take a leaf out of eBay’s strategy, where buyers are rated, sellers are rated and products are reviewed – their entire experience is social and reliant on user-generated content. Outside of a company's website, you need to think about how to more closely integrate into Facebook (with 800m global users), LinkedIn (more than 150m professionals), RenRen (over 120m Chinese consumers), Cyworld, Mixi, Mobage, Gree (the latter few for gamification - a critical element of social e-commerce in markets like China) and microblogging services like Twitter, Sina Weibo and QQ Weibo.

Everything is going mobile – There are now more mobile users than Internet users. Mobile Internet users account for 60%+ of social network usage, are driving new retail loyalty location-based services like Foursquare and will bridge the divide between physical retail stores and e-commerce. Customers are now using mobile devices to walk into retail stores to scan bar codes, compare product specs and prices and gather recommendations from people who have bought the same product (word-of-mouth, ratings & reviews, social media). There is also huge increase in the amount of traffic coming into a company website and managed community properties via mobile internet. You need clear plans for integration with mobile in 2012.

Customers are demanding are a more Retail-like experience from Online – With the rise of retail and eTail, customers are demanding to touch and feel products, have all payments options (including cash, bank transfer, credit card, PayPal, etc.) and have either take home or immediate delivery (same day or within the same week). eTailers (such as Taobao in China) have the ability to compare products, great learning content (including images and videos), cash payment options and same day delivery. Customers now expect this and most tech companies need to play catch up to get there in 2012.

Content needs to be “portable” and usable in different platforms – Currently most company's view of content is limited to product information and is located only on its website. This is particularly true of e-commerce companies. You need to consider how to take excellent content and make it available where your customers are (for a B2B company: on LinkedIn, in the company managed social sites, in communities, in Webinars/virtual events, etc.). IBM do an excellent job of this and more companies need to learn from their example.

2012 is the year of the dragon. It's a very auspicious time that will be a breakthrough year in e-commerce for those with the courage to try new things, truly embrace social and mobile, and make eTailers your best friends.

Two Old School Technology Prediction Fails (Telephone & Radio)

I was reading and came across these two fantastic quotes from nay-sayers on new technology. It's easy to imagine similar thoughts being expressed about e-commerce, mobile and more recently social media. The moral is to keep an open mind and be a continuous learner, not overly relying too much of your current expertise and history to-date, otherwise you could end up in the spectacular fail club below.

“This ‘telephone’ has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us.” —Western Union internal memo, 1876.


“The wireless music box has no imaginable commercial value. Who would pay for a message sent to nobody in particular?” — David Sarnoff’s associates in response to his urgings for investment in the radio in the 1920s.

Damien Cummings: Social Media Q&A

What motivates you to be involved in social media?

Social media is a fundamental shift in business and communications – it’s something you need to be involved in stay in the game. That might sound like a grandiose statement but I truly feel that social media will have as big an impact on our business as the invention of the Internet and our move into e-commerce. It’s like the telephone. Many years ago there used to be “telephone departments” and people with “telephone” in their job title. It was a niche area for experts that understood this amazing technology. Nowadays, there’s a telephone on everyone’s desk and a mobile phone in everyone’s pocket and it’s deeply integrated into everything we do. There are no longer specialists, it’s just how business gets done. Social media is exactly the same. In 5 years time I see it deeply integrated into the online, retail and call centre buying path for our customers, social media training will be part of all new employees induction into Dell and we’ll even encourage all of our team members to Tweet, Blog and spread their thoughts and ideas to customers through social media. It’s amazing to think that this could even radically transform our customer service and marketing teams. For example, do we need “faceless” marketers if a customer can talk directly to the team designing our products? It’s an incredibly interesting (and somewhat scary!) future. I’m really passionate and motivated by this.

What tools do you use and how does social media help you perform your role?

Chatter is a fantastic tool for sharing information and insight with internal teams. Externally, I use Twitter and LinkedIn to publish a lot of “thought leadership” material on digital marketing, e-commerce and social media. I also have a Blog “Digital Future” but I feel bad because it’s not updated as often as it should be. I also often check out local forums and blogs to see what customers are saying about Dell, our products and the website experience (my day job!). It’s fantastic to get real-time, honest feedback from customers on what we’re doing right and where we can improve. I use Facebook quite a bit, but more to check out Brand pages and applications, less about personal use. I keep Facebook for my private time and limit this to friends, family and close colleagues.

Before you really got involved, did you have to overcome any fears about it? If so, what kind of fears?

I’m probably one of the exceptions to this, as I’ve been in digital marketing for over 15 years and absolutely live and breathe new technologies like social media. However, privacy is still one of my key concerns. I love connecting with people via social media but I clearly keep my professional contacts on LinkedIn and Twitter, with my friends on Facebook (or other closed networks). Location-based services such as Foursquare are a concern, as it’s easy to get excited about “checking in” and forget that not everyone has the best intentions (i.e. an extreme example: you’re signaling to thieves that you’ve left your house!) but the potential benefits and sensible use really offset this. The other worry I have is that everything you do on the Internet and in social media is permanent. You can never have a bad day and vent your frustrations – there’s always going to be a record of unruly behavior, so it’s important to think before hitting Enter.

What are the obstacles to getting involved in social media?

One of the biggest issues is finding the time to share thoughts, ideas and excellent content. I do a lot of my online research first thing in the morning or in the evening and then I put all my Tweets and other content into a scheduling app called Buffer (www.bufferapp.com). This way my content is sharing throughout the day and I can focus on periodically checking Twitter, LinkedIn and my Blog for comments or questions. This is a wonderful time-saver and really helps coordinate my use of social media.
The other challenge is understanding what social media platforms to be involved in – there are now so many! Personally, I use Facebook for keeping in touch with friends and family (people who I’ve actually met and would have a beer with) but not for professional connections. Twitter is great for forming an “interest graph” – in my case this is people who are interested in my thoughts on digital marketing, e-commerce and social media. I also use the same content on LinkedIn to reach a more broad, professional audience. I also have a profile on Ushi.com, Sina Weibo, Friendster (although I never use this) and MySpace (remember MySpace? I don’t use it anymore but at one point in time it was great!)

Are there people you modeled your social media efforts on? If so, who?

There are a number of excellent social media news outlets that I read every day: Mashable, TechCrunch, Business Insider and Penn Olson (in Asia). These blogs/publications are really valuable for getting to the pulse of what’s happening in the social world. As for people, I tend not to look at the usual US social media leaders and look more for great content in Asia. Since my role is already very digitally focused, I seek out my colleagues in similar organizations (Marketing and Digital/Online leaders at companies like Microsoft and Intel) and at our competitors (Apple, HP, RIM, Nokia, etc). It’s great to get fired up with a strong sense of competition when you see that we’re pulling ahead of our rivals – everything is much more transparent and real-time in social media, and I get a great sense of how we’re doing competitively in real-time. On an individual basis, we are very lucky to have one of the most social media savvy CEOs ever. Michael is a real inspiration and we’re very lucky he’s been such an advocate of social media. This strong executive support has fundamentally transformed Dell and is one of the big reasons customers see us as forward thinking and innovative. First we got the direct model right, then e-commerce and now it’s social media. This makes me proud to work at Dell.

How would you quantify the ROI you’ve experienced in social media, personally and professionally?

On a personal note, I’ve met a lot of excellent professional networking contacts that have made me more successful. This has been done through LinkedIn and Twitter. Internally, Chatter has allowed me to connect to people in other parts of Dell that I wasn’t aware of previously. Dell really does operate through a network of informal contacts in a highly matrixed organization, so Chatter is a great tool for helping build those relationships. In a business sense, there’s an even more clear ROI. In my role managing APJ digital and e-commerce, I see fantastic returns from our group buying and social merchandising activities. There’s also great benefits when you think about social networks as a CRM platform. We have customers who have given us their contact information, are willing to be contacted and, like email, we see increasing return on investment over time. The critical issue here is that we need to maintain the conversation with our customers every day – reinforcing Dell brand values, discussing how awesome our products and are how much we care about our customer’s needs.

My interview with ClickZ Asia: Dell's social media listening command centre, social commerce & staff training in social.

The original post by Adaline Lau appears on ClickZ Asia.

For a brand that went through Dell Hell five years ago, the American PC manufacturer has not only bounced back from its social media nightmare but has become one of the most well-known global case studies for making money on social media platforms.

Today, Dell earns US$15 million in revenue driving deals through @Delloutlet to its more than 1.57 million followers on Twitter.

The company also boasts a strong social media presence with more than 40 Facebook profiles worldwide, with thousands of staff representing the company on Twitter, and it has cracked the China market by becoming the most popular business brand in the country’s top social networking site RenRen with 800,000 fans.

Damien Cummings, online and social media director, Asia Pacific and Japan from Dell shared the company’s success in social media commercialization and marketing on the first day of SES HK 2011.
Cummings said a key social media strategy for Dell is content and listening and it is putting serious resources into doing that by setting up a Social Media Listening Command Center in Austin, Texas last year that now monitors around 25,000 conversations daily.

With Asia Pacific becoming an increasingly important region, particularly markets like India, Australia, China, and Japan, Dell has rolled out a mini version of the social media listening practice in India this month.

He said that the company is in the process of setting up a social media listening hub for Asia either in Singapore or Malaysia with a headcount of 10 staff comprising listeners, a leader that oversees analytics and CRM, as well as community managers that are trained in using social media for customer enquiry.

The Asia arm of the social media listening command center will also include presence in China that is scheduled to go live in the next six months.

Dell currently uses Radian 6 for social media monitoring and CIC in China but Cummings said they are considering local monitoring companies to fill the gaps for other Asia markets.

Social Commerce: Dell Swarm and Facebook Commerce
While Groupon and LivingSocial have converted many consumers to group buying, which is sometimes lumped into ‘social commerce’, this concept is not new for Dell.
The company launched a global pilot of the strategy in Singapore in May 2009, originally called the Dell–Intel Swarm. Since then, Dell rolled out an improved version in Canada, followed by Australia and is now live in the U.K. with plans to launch in other Asia markets such as China, Japan, and Southeast Asia.

Facebook commerce is an emerging platform that Dell is exploring. However, Cummings said he is “not putting big bets” on F-commerce because the social network is more of a platform to connect with friends than transactions so user-generated content such as ratings and reviews is key on the social site.

Training: Unleashing Employees as Social Media Advocates
Getting executive buy-in at Dell is not an issue since its founder and CEO Michael Dell is a big believer of social media. However, training 100,000 employees is no small feat. Not only does it involve human resource but a logistical challenge as well, which is now managed by a two-person team globally.

Within the company, employees have to undergo training from a specific curriculum before getting certification and so far 9,000 have graduated from the program.

“Having a social media policy in place is absolutely critical”, said Cummings, as the rights and responsibilities of each employee will be based around the policy.

Nonetheless, the internal training is by no means about producing ‘Dell robots’ but to keep to key principles such as protecting information, being transparent, responsible, and nice, having fun, and connecting.

On Monetizing Social Media…

Here’s what Cummings has to say:
“It starts with listening. You need to understand your customers. Many marketing driven campaigns are based on big ideas, forget that. You need to listen and identify key influencers”.

“Use your social media as a CRM platform. If you think about fans, likes, followers and connections that you are developing, think about how you develop an engagement plan. And treat them the same way you would treat direct mail/email because it’s exactly the same, you need to keep them interested and you need to keep getting the sales message out to them”.

Campaign Spotlight: Technology (Singapore). Great Feedback & Pictures.

Last week I spoke at the Campaign Spotlight: Technology event in Singapore. I presented on "How to get started and make money from social media" and presented Dell's case study on our social media success. I'm very pleased that I was rated the top speaker of the event (thank you to everyone who was there and participated). If you want a copy of the presentation please feel free to reach out to me: Twitter @damiencummings, LinkedIn: http://sg.linkedin.com/in/damiencummings.

Here are a couple of photos from the event too.

Social Media Lessons From The Corporate World For Medical Professionals.

It's been a while since I updated but I've got a whole load of things to add over the coming days - stay tuned!

My brother Shane Cummings, the Managing Editor of Medical Forum Magazine asked me to add an opinion piece on the pros and cons of social media for Australian medical professionals. You can see the full (and nicely edited) article in Medical Forum Magazine and you can follow their updates on Twitter via @MedicalForumWA

Here's the complete, unedited and raw article for your reading pleasure.

Social Media Lessons From The Corporate World For Medical Professionals.


In my current role, a Social Media and Online leader across sales and marketing at Dell, I talk a lot about the commercial risks and opportunities that social media presents. On one hand, there’s a risk that employees could say the wrong thing – anything from inappropriate comments about or to customers, offensive remarks, inappropriate behaviour or even releasing confidential company information (often inadvertently but in the worst case scenario, deliberately). The opportunities however, hugely outweigh the negatives. Social media gives a commercial company fantastic, unmatched connection directly to customers. No longer are big companies faceless corporations. The real people within a brand can talk directly to customers – the guy who designs a product can have a meaningful conversation with customers who use it, feedback can be given directly to staff developing, managing or supporting a product and of course customers can talk to each other about their experiences in virtuous circle of positive feedback, real life tips on their experience and self-help when things go wrong.

When asked to look at the risk and benefits of social media for the Australian medical profession, much of this equally applies. There are great lessons from the world of business that can be of great benefits to patients and a real professional advantage for Australian doctors who have the courage to embrace these new opportunities early on.

The risks:

Medical professionals face a dilemma in both engaging patients directly through social media and in managing social media platforms (like a Facebook page or Blog) where patients can meet and swap health information. Should you be too involved in a patient’s life? What if people come to the wrong conclusion about a medical procedure or diagnosis (made worse by the social media community validating that diagnosis, without actually ever seeing the patient)? And of course, there’s a challenge in maintaining the time required to “seed” content into these communities, directly respond to patient enquiries and maintain your Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn (etc.) profiles.

The opportunities:

Firstly, there’s a real opportunity to differentiate your practice and be seen as a medical thought leader because of your presence in social media. Successful Doctors spend an enormous amount of time networking, keeping up-to-date on the latest best practices in medicine and forging a name for themselves through word-of-mouth, media and patient referrals. Social media puts this into hyper drive and can turn a struggling practice of talented media professionals into a thriving business. Patients talk. Social media amplifies this talk in an unprecedented way.

Secondly, social media is fast becoming the preferred method for patients to understand their health and how to get the best treatment. Previously, I worked with a baby milk brand who was marketing their products directly to pregnant women in the early stages of pregnancy. Their entire customer relationship management and engagement plan was based around one key customer insight – in the early stages of pregnancy there is a large amount of doubt and risk. In those first three months of pregnancy, Mothers will not reach out to their families and friends but they will turn to strangers anonymously to understand if what they’re going through is normal, what they should expect and to understand what they should do next. Their strategy involved having women who have gone through pregnancy before managing their communities (Facebook, Twitter, Blogs, etc.), being available via Online Chat, as well as more traditional call centre/telephone. This remarkable strategy was the core pillar of their marketing and has built enormous loyalty (close to 90% of Mothers choose to stay with the first baby milk brand they choose. This is up to 4 - 5 years of brand loyalty).

How to get started:

The first thing you need to do is listen. Whether this simply look at medical or health forums or your own Facebook or Twitter profile, or all the way up to working with a specialist provider of social media listening services depends on how deeply you want to engage. At Dell, there are 25,000 daily conversations about the brand. We use a global software tool called Radian6 to monitor those conversations. It’s as simple as setting up “key words” in the web-based software. For Dell, its phrases like “Dell”, “Laptop” and “Alienware gaming laptop”. For medical professionals this could be anything from symptoms to medicines to medical procedures. The important thing is that you, or someone you trust, is listening. Then it’s a matter of thinking about your social media presence as an editorial calendar. Social media is not static – it’s constantly evolving and needs to be continually updated. If you’re setting up a Facebook profile for your medical practice, I advise you to have at least a 6 month editorial plan, as well as at least one daily update (4 – 12 updates per day would be ideal). And the most important thing is to really engage. Whether it be a simple acknowledgement of someone’s question, or publishing an in-depth research report or thought leadership article you’ve written, just get out there, start engaging and you’ll see tremendous benefits.

How are people really using LinkedIn?

Here's a great Infographic that appeared on Mashable (from Charlie White). The methodology used in the development of this Infographic/research saw Researchers at Lab 42 ask 500 LinkedIn users how they used the service.
Among the fun facts they uncovered: We found it interesting the way top level executives use the service in vastly different ways from entry-level workers. More below: