Ecommerce and Social Networking: What is the ROI?

[mandy]

Many retailers question the use of social networks as marketing tools because of the inability to prove return on investment in hard dollars. Roxy says these retailers are missing the point.

“It’s not always about measuring sales or activity on an e-commerce site,” says Chris Todd, director of online marketing at Roxy. “With social networks it’s really about looking at overall brand engagement and buzz. Ultimately that will translate into sales, it’s just not as obvious.”

Many marketers and social web experts agree with Todd, saying it’s difficult to make an argument against free access to scores of millions of potential customers who already have made public basic demographic information and their interests...

full article: http://www.internetretailer.com/article.asp?id=26244