Simplifying SoLoMo: Consumer Strategies for Smart Marketers

Whether the term SoLoMo  or any of it’s variations will stick around, the ideology behind it—the cumulative power of social, local and mobile and it’s emerging strategies—is here to stay. Consumer behaviors are forever changed and we as marketers have the job of figuring out how to reach a new kind of prospect within the purview of our respective businesses.

Unfortunately, as we transition from one methodology from another, or as in this case find ourselves thrust into the middle of it, it can be hard to figure out what end is up. Particularly when everyone has their unique take, and often times, a product to sell. Sure, a lot of great ideas have emerged as a result of all this revolutionary change, but so has a lot of clutter.

Having worked at a number of ad agencies and corporations now in a variety of marketing roles, and having had the privilege of working with some brilliant minds, I’m going to take a stab at simplifying the new SoLoMo marketplace in an attempt to help you see where to focus your efforts right now and then build from there.

SoLoMo Behaviors and Strategies
As you probably already know, consumers no longer walk into a store and just buy things. For pre-meditated purchases, they do research and look for three things:

1. They look at independent customer ratings
2. They ask their friends for their opinions. (I’ve seen some indicators that this is trending down. In my opinion, many are starting to realize that their friends aren’t always the best source of information and they are relying more on experts)
3. They look into a company’s ethical practices to make sure a brand’s values align with theirs. For example, when faced with the choice of two brands, consumers will often choose things like “Local”, “Environmental”, “Charitable”, etc. over price.

Note: If you’re a B2B marketer, the buying behaviors are pretty much the same; just amplify everything. Consumers are looking at ratings, reading research, going to colleagues and doing background checks.

If you want to take advantage of these consumer behaviors, you need to have a social presence at each one of these evaluation intersections.

1. You need to have independent product reviews and testimonials where your customers are doing their research. Make sure you collect the review data so you can identify product issues early and make overall improvements.
2. When it comes to their friends, while you can’t always control what they may say, you can build widely spread consumer trust (trust is a very BIG deal) by keeping your brand out there and keeping your brand’s reputation in tact. Obviously, there are a lot of vehicles for doing this—this is branding101 stuff.
3. To address the “ethical evaluation” stage (also closely tied to trust), just put it all out there. What are your environmental standards? What charities do you support? Are you local? What is your financial track record (B2B)? Think of all the value questions your target consumer is going to have and provide them with a carefully crafted answer.

While most buyers out there do their research ahead of time, you can’t completely write off impulse buyers. Impulse buyers fall into two major categories:

1. They are there to purchase something else and an unplanned item catches their eye.
2. They are out shopping for something they need but didn’t have the time or the foresight to do any research and are counting on you to provide them with the information they need to make a decision.

Impulse buys are usually smaller purchases (why they didn’t take the time to research). Much like pre-meditated buys, when preparing to make a purchase, potential buyers are looking at key product features, quality standards, consumer ratings and evaluating their trust of your brand, just on location at a faster speed.

When you are trying get the sale from impulse buyers, obviously placement is important, but there are a few other social and mobile- friendly must-haves for your products and POP:

• Customer ratings (stars)
• Customer testimonials/quotes
• Major product differentiators
• Quality statements
• Ethical statements
• Coordinating mobile product pages with FAQs

Now, while all of these “must-have” elements are important, mobile is the big story here. Before the days of SoLoMo, you had to rely only on your box copy and product placement. With SoLoMo, you have an entirely new bag of tricks at your disposal. Think branded retail apps that create urgency like offers with short expiration dates, side-by-side comparisons to facilitate decision making, picture apps that let consumers see how an outfit will look on them without having to try it on, in-store GPS to help customers locate products, short product demos that show how to use a certain kind of hair product or apply make-up, how a running shoe’s cushioning reduces impact, how a certain exercise will help you lose weight, etc. If you know what pains your target market, you can give them a solution on demand if you are prepared. You can’t put a value on that kind of targeted marketing.

While the platforms people use continue to change somewhat (Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, etc.), the buying behaviors remain fairly constant. Ideally, you can identify where your prospects are doing their research and be at those evaluation intersections, but you will likely experience a little hit and miss. Don’t be discouraged, that’s just the nature of the web and social trends. The most important things are to continually work at building consumer trust and to have the answers to consumer’s questions when and where they need them, as often as possible. Consumers are smarter and more resourceful than ever—as long as you have the answers out there, they will find them.