Page 232 - Introduction to Electronic Commerce and Social Commerce

216 7 Social Commerce: Foundations, Social Marketing, and Advertising

• Fotolia. Fotolia (fotolia.com) is a social marketplace for 100,000 webstores worldwide, serving 300,000 artists, includ-
royalty free photos, images, and video clips. In 2014, ing those who are already established. Audiolife was acquired
there were more than 31 million images available on the by Allince Entertainment in May 2012.
site. It serves a community of artists, designers, and other
creative people who express themselves through images, Example: How Buy Buttons Work
forums, and blogs. Buyers can legally buy images (pay Following Facebook, other social networks and retailers
only one time for each or periodically) and then use these introduced “buy buttons.” Examples are: Twitter, Pinterest,
images and photos as they wish (e.g., resell them, modify Instagram (Kuchler 2015), Google and many more.
them). For details, see us.fotolia.com/Info/AboutUs.
• Flipsy. Anyone can use Flipsy (flipsy.com) to list, buy, Socially Oriented Person-to-Person (P2P) Selling,
and sell books, music, movies, and games. It was created Buying, Renting, or Bartering
to fill the need for a free and trustworthy media market-
place. Flipsy does not charge commissions in order to When individuals trade online, they may do so with some
increase the trading volume. Payment processing for items social elements. For example, some consider craigslist.org
purchased is handled by a third party, such as PayPal. to be a socially oriented virtual community and so is altim-
• Storenvy. Storenvy (storenvy.com) is a marketplace for etergroup.com. Here are some more examples:
unique businesses and photos. At no cost to sellers, a sim-
ple way is made available (no programming experience is P2P Lending
needed) to create personalized webstores. Sellers have the P2P money lending is growing rapidly, enabling one person
ability to make the sites as socially friendly as they wish, to lend money directly to another. In the process, they get to
giving customers the chance to interact with the seller as know each other. Another start-up created a community of
well as other customers. people that rent goods to people in need, usually for the short
• ShopSocially. ShopSocially (shopsocially.com) is a term. Snapgoods.com helps these people connect over the
consumer- to-consumer marketing communication and Internet.
experience-sharing platform for shopping. This platform
also enables shoppers to recommend products to their P2P Sharing (also Known as Collaborative Consumption)
friends. ShopSocially combines the concepts of online SnapGoods facilitates P2P sharing. Some other sites like Swap-
shopping and social networks, creating a new business BabyGoods.com (swapbabygoods.com) and Swap mamas
model of online social shopping. Users can solicit shopping (swapmamas.com) that help people share fruits that are grow-
information from friends via Facebook, Twitter, and e-mail. ing in their yards or find fruit trees on public lands have a niche
A combination of shopping questions, their answers, and market. The sharing and renting trend is booming, especially
purchases shared by friends creates a powerful experience during the economic recession; and there is a “green” aspect as
and shopping knowledge base. For details and benefits to well—saving on the use of resources. There is also the social
retailers, see shopsocially.com. aspect of sharing, allowing people to make meaningful con-
nections with others (see Walsh 2010 for details).
Direct Sales from Within Social Networks
Several variations exist. Some people share cars (ride
sharing; e.g., Uber and Lyft), others invite travelers to stay
There is an increased volume of direct sales, mostly on free in their homes, or exchange homes (e.g., homeex-
Facebook. Here is an example:
change.com) for a short periods and much more. LendingTree
(lendingtree.com) is another company that allows prospec-
Example: How Musicians Sell Online via Social Networks tive borrowers to get quick offers from multiple lenders. For
Many musicians and other artists used to invest money to make
a case study of P2P lending, see Online File W7.1.
their own CDs, T-shirts, and other items before they sold them. In May 2013, Google invested money in the P2P invest-
Now there is a free social commerce solution. Audiolife Inc.
ment site lendingclub.com. This company became a success
(an Alliance Entertainment Company) provides artists with in 2015, and it is listed on the New York stock exchange.
webstores (one per artist), where artists (sellers) can directly
interact with potential buyers. This arrangement also allows
artists to “make-to-order” and sell merchandise.
To entice fans to order products, artists post their own Shopping for Virtual Goods in a Virtual
Audiolife selection on any large social network site (e.g., Economy
Facebook). Each order, even for one item, is then forwarded to
the artist for production. Audiolife arranges payment and ship- An increasing number of shoppers purchase all kinds of vir-
ping to the buyers. By 2012, Audiolife powered close to tual products and services online. Virtual goods are computer