Consumers Want Twitter, Facebook, and Email

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Taco Bell Uses Social Media to Combat Class Action Suit

2010 has been referred to as the Year of Facebook in some places; in others, it was simply called the year of ‘social.’ This is probably because that year saw an aggressive use of social media by brick and mortar companies. Companies like Starbucks, Toyota and L’Oreal made creative use of soci.... More »

Yahoo Posts Third-Quarter Earnings; Stock Climbing

Yahoo's third-quarter earnings met or beat most analysts' forecasts, and thanks to this news, stock is now climbing upwards in after-hours trading. Analysts expected to see operating income reported at $178 million, but Yahoo easily topped that with $189 million. In the third-quarter of 2009, Y.... More »

General Category Blocking Tested by AdSense

Good news for Google AdSense users: Google has announced via their AdSense blog that they are currently testing an expanded version of category blocking, known as general category blocking. Google explained further by indicating that general category blocking allows users to block even more cat.... More »

Chatter Goes Mobile

About 20,000 companies can't be wrong. Salesforce has created a mobile version of its popular enterprise social networking platform. Users with a Blackberry, Android, iPod Touch, iPhone, or Ipad will be able to take advantage of Chatter Mobile. Chatter Mobile is designed to allow you to be able.... More »

Starbucks' New Portal Caters to Mobile Users

Starbucks takes "listening to the customer" to a whole new level with the design of its soon-to-be released Web landing portal. Starbucks Digital Network will be optimized with mobile devices in mind primarily, rather than traditional web browsers. The majority of connections to Starbucks' free.... More »

Consumers form the backbone of any business. If the customers who buy your products or services are not happy, you can be sure that they will go somewhere else for the things that they need. It is vital that you keep your customers happy and that you keep up with the things that they are wanting.

ExactTarget has done a new report that reveals that consumers actually expect the brands they buy to interact with them through email, Facebook, and Twitter. Consumers don’t care that there is a competition between all three services for marketing budgets. They just expect that their favorite companies are going to interact with them consistently through these services.

While the majority (93%) of consumers have subscribed to email marketing, there are others who follow on Facebook and Twitter. 38% of consumers are fans of brands they use often on Facebook while 5% follow their favorite brands on Twitter.

Now those are pretty big numbers, but the amount of people who actually purchase from a particular brand thanks to marketing on these services is equally impressive. 27 percent of those who subscribe via email purchase from a brand while 17 percent of people who are fans of a brand on Facebook make a purchase. Twitter only gets 5% of the share of the following but 37 percent of those who follow make a purchase.

Promotions and discounts offered through Facebook, Twitter, and email marketing play a huge role in consumers wanting to interact with their favorite brands online. In fact, 67% subscribed to email, 40% to Facebook pages, and 31% to Twitter feeds purely to receive discounts or promotions.

People recommend their favorite brands to family and friends through these services, especially if there is a special promotion they think their friends or relatives will want to take advantage of. It’s easy to see why if your business doesn’t have an online presence it needs to get one. You get followers, and thus customers, through online services and grow your business.

It’s probably best to use the power of all three services. Does your current business use one or all of these services?