Social Commerce as Base Factor No. 1 for SoLoMo

Abstract

The term “social media” or, more recently, “social Internet”, can be used as a synonym for the term Web 2.0. Within the framework of social media, information can be used both in verbal and multimedia form. This includes, for example, photos, videos, music, voice recordings and games (cf. Heymann-Reder, Social Media Marketing: Erfolgreiche Strategien für Sie und Ihr Unternehmen (Successful strategies for you and your company), p. 20, 2011). Communication on social media is usually networked worldwide and creates new interaction opportunities for both users and companies. Well-known social media platforms include Facebook, Twitter, Google+, YouTube, LinkedIn, Pinterest and Polyvore. MySpace is regarded as a “social media pioneer”, but has more or less had its day. In contrast, YouTube now plays a prominent role as a video-sharing platform and is a global institution, without which we can no longer imagine our lives. By far the most popular form of social media today is connecting to a website with Facebook, but many German online retailers have not yet made use of this phenomenon. There is often uncertainty about which aims should be pursued through social media. As a result, the potential of a Facebook connection is not fully exploited and usually amounts to nothing more than just a “Like” button.