We are entering a new era of commerce

Social networks are reshaping the ways in which we discover, purchase and interact with brands. From food delivery to buying furniture, clothing, accessories and everything in between, we are ordering and sharing our online purchases at an astronomical rate.

People are influenced to purchase through social networks

Hubspot and Survey Monkey’s 2019 Global Buying Behaviour Report found that over half of consumers tell friends and family about their favourite products at least once a week. And it’s not only friends and family who are influencing purchase decisions, according to eMarketer one in five shoppers between the ages of 18 and 29 discover new products through celebrities and influencers. So, it should come as no surprise that for the past two years social networks have delivered the highest growth rate in driving visits to U.S. retail websites — nearly seven times the growth of paid search.

When companies tap into these trends magical things can happen. There is a whole slew of new billion dollar brands that have been able to successfully ride these trends: Glossier, Revolve, Gymshark, Fashion Nova, Warby Parker, and Casper to name a few.

E-commerce in Canada is Big Business

Here in Canada, we are seeing a huge boost in e-commerce activity as well. According to Canada Post’s 2019 Canadian E-commerce Benchmark Report, 80% of Canadians are buying online, and the average number of online purchases made annually has increased by 58%. This year alone, Canadians are expected to spend $39 billion online, and when given a choice Canadians overwhelmingly prefer to buy online from Canadian businesses and retailers, according to CIRA. It’s great to see Canadian companies like Endy, Knix, Jenny Bird, Mejuri, Good Food Box, Skip the Dishes, Freshii, and Ritual thriving in this new era of commerce.

Introducing The Commerce & Conversions Edition of influenceTHIS

For the past three years, influenceTHIS has been helping Canadian marketers better understand the social and influencer marketing space. We’ve been watching as more brands expand their social and influencer marketing efforts; during this process, one key challenge we keep seeing is how to tie these efforts to a measurable ROI. 

As a direct result, we’re launching a ‘Commerce & Conversions Edition’ in an effort to explore how companies are leveraging social and influencer marketing to drive online sales and actions.

A perfect example of adapting to this new era of commerce is Swedish watch company Daniel Wellington. Started in 2011 by 26-year-old Filip Tysander, the company launched with a micro-influencer campaign in order to spread its message to the world. Seven years later, it has received the most influencer mentions of any brand on Instagram and is valued at one billion dollars. We’ve invited them to speak at the ‘Commerce & Conversions Edition’ to bring insight to how they approach social and influencer marketing, and how they have managed to stay ahead of the curve for so long. 

We’ve also invited Andrew D’Souza, Co-Founder of Clearbanc to deliver a keynote presentation. Clearbanc is a new type of fund that invests $10,000 to $10 million to support to support the digital marketing initiatives and inventory of e-commerce and other online businesses. Clearbanc is betting hundreds of millions of dollars that one of the keys to growth in the e-commerce space is more and better digital marketing. 

On top of this, we’ll be diving into the tactics of social and influencer marketing to understand how to better optimize for conversions across different types of influencer marketing campaigns. This will involve exploring experiential activations that are proven to convert, amplifying social and influencer campaigns through conversational marketing, and sampling and gifting programs and how to use social and influencer campaigns to reward and foster loyal brand followers.

As an extension of the conference, and to help recognize the best in influencer marketing we are launching an Awards program with a focus on key campaign types: Branded Content, Competitions and Giveaways, Experiential Activations, Integrated Influencer Marketing Campaigns, and Brand Ambassador Programs.

To effectively explore this subject matter it’s imperative to connect with the people and companies that are making it happen. That is why we have developed our Power Meetings program which enables you to connect with any of the attendees for 15 minute face-to-face meetings during the conference.

We are excited to explore this space, and hope you’ll join us on the journey.
Check out full details at www.influencethis.ca or follow us on LinkedIN.