social sharing: best practices to turn your users into brand ambassadors

©2013, LoginRadius Inc. | Email – [email protected] | www.loginradius.com |

Social Sharing: Best Practices to Turn Your Users into Brand Ambassadors Published by LoginRadius Inc on April 25, 2013, Version 1.0

This whitepaper discusses the best practices for social sharing on websites and focuses on LoginRadius’ Social Share solution.

©2013, LoginRadius Inc. | Email – [email protected] | www.loginradius.com |

Content 1. Selection of Social Networks ..................................................................................................... 1

2. Positioning of the LoginRadius Social Sharing Widget ............................................................... 3

2.2 E-Commerce Websites ............................................................................................................ 4

Below Product Description ........................................................................................................ 4

Below the “Add to Cart” Button ................................................................................................ 4

Product Review Submitted by the User..................................................................................... 5

2.3 Other Websites ....................................................................................................................... 5

APPENDIX-I (A) Horizontal Social Sharing widget themes .................................................................. 6

APPENDIX-I (B) Vertical Social Sharing widget themes ....................................................................... 6

Appendix-II: List of sharing networks supported by LoginRadius platform ......................................... 7

©2013, LoginRadius Inc. | Email – [email protected] | www.loginradius.com | 1

Introduction Social sharing is being widely utilized across all industries and mediums, such as news and media sites, e-commerce sites, blogs, etc. by users who want to share web content with their friends, and thus has become an integral part of web applications. Content sharing leads to significant referral traffic for your website, thereby boosting your business with high returns on marketing efforts --- also known as online word-of-mouth marketing. There are two components that make up the best practices for social sharing: 1) Selection of social networks 2) Position of Social Share widget 1. Selection of Social Networks The optimal selection of social networks depends upon the following two factors: 1.1 User Demography Always select the sharing networks based on your users’ demographics: region, language, profession, interest, and age group. Most sharing networks represent a specific target population. For example, LinkedIn is primarily used by professionals, and vKontakte is widely used in Russia. If you think your users will print your content, then it is a good idea to include the print button in the sharing widget. 1.2 Popularity of Social Networks It is always a good idea to choose the most popular sharing networks. At LoginRadius, we analyzed sharing activities across our platform and the following table shows the top 15 sharing networks by user preference: Top 15 Social Sharing Networks on LoginRadius Platform

Rank Social Sharing Network User Preference (in %)

1 Facebook 52.00%

2 Twitter 21.00%

3 Google Plus 8.00%

4 Email 4.60%

5 LinkedIn 4.10%

6 Google 2.20%

7 vkontakte 1.40%

8 Digg 1.10%

9 Tumblr 1.00%

10 Yahoo 1.00%

11 MySpace 0.80%

12 Delicious 0.70%

13 Pinterest 0.60%

14 Reddit 0.60%

15 Live 0.30%


To learn more about social network trends, read our recent industry research: Social Network Statistics – Social Login and Social Sharing Trends – Q1 2013 LoginRadius provides you with options to customize the social sharing widget, so that you can select the sharing networks to be shown, set their order, and choose your desired social sharing theme.

http://www.slideshare.net/loginradius/login-radius-socialnetworkstatsforlogin-and-sharing-q1-2013

http://www.slideshare.net/loginradius/login-radius-socialnetworkstatsforlogin-and-sharing-q1-2013


2. Positioning of the LoginRadius Social Sharing Widget The position of the social sharing widget drastically affects sharing activities on a website and the resulting referral traffic. The position of the sharing widget typically depends upon your website type, which we have divided into 3 categories: 2.1 Blogs, News, and Content Websites The best chance of your content being shared is when the user gets hooked onto your content. We recommend the following three positions to motivate users into sharing:

If the design and aesthetics of the page permits, placing the social sharing widget just below the content title will provide the greatest value. We recommend using the Social Counter widget with sharing options.

Always add the sharing widget to the end of the content as users are most inclined to share right after reading the article.

Add the Social Counter widget to the left of the content.

LoginRadius’ CMS plugins provide the option to enable the social sharing interface both before and after the content, as well as the option to place the social counter interface to the left of the content. For non-CMS websites, LoginRadius provides JavaScript code that can be placed in the desired position of the website.


2.2 E-Commerce Websites If you have an e-commerce store or any other website that promotes products to your website’s visitors, you can use Social Share in a variety of ways to help you reach your goal. Below Product Description Providing an option to share the product page will result in more leads. As the product description is shared among the user’s social circle, an increasing number of qualified leads will be captured as friends and family go on to share the product within their circles. Below the “Add to Cart” Button Once the user makes the decision to buy a product by adding to cart, displaying the sharing widget right below the “Add to Cart” button will increase the chances of the user sharing the product.


Product Review Submitted by the User Allowing users to share their product review with their social networks is a great way to engage customers. A good review of your product will go a long way towards establishing your brand in the mind of your prospective customers. As social shopping is the next big thing in the e-commerce space, an increasing number of users will buy products on the recommendation of their family and friends. Users shall be motivated to share at the time of submitting the review. 2.3 Other Websites Most website pages can easily be categorized into one of the two aforementioned categories, but there are a few pages which do not fit into either category. For those pages, we suggest using the vertical social sharing widget to the left of the content (if the webpage design allows) in a location that is immediately visible on the page without the need to scroll.

About LoginRadius LoginRadius is a Canadian startup that offers social infrastructure: Social Login, Social Share, User Profile Data, Social Analytics, Social Counter, and Single Sign-On. The company was founded in 2011 and serves over 50,000 websites around the globe. LoginRadius is also among Canada's Top 50 Startups. LoginRadius’s solutions are independent of technology platform and can be integrated on any web or mobile application. Currently, we offer 12 CMS plugins for WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, osCommerce, DotNetNuke, PrestaShop, Zen Cart, Magento, X-Cart, BlogEngine, and Vanilla Forum, as well as 8 SDKs for PHP, .NET, Java, Python, ASP, Ruby on Rails, NodeJS, and HTML5. To learn more, please visit www.loginradius.com

Please see the following two appendices on next pages: Appendix-I (A): Horizontal Social Sharing widget themes Appendix-I (B): Vertical Social Sharing widget themes Appendix-II: List of sharing networks supported by LoginRadius platform

http://www.loginradius.com/


APPENDIX-I (A) Horizontal Social Sharing widget themes

APPENDIX-I (B) Vertical Social Sharing widget themes


Appendix-II: List of sharing networks supported by LoginRadius platform

List of Social Sharing Networks Supported by LoginRadius

Facebook StumbleUpon SheToldMe Linkter

Twitter PDF Diggita Xerpi

Google Plus FriendFeed Fark Faves

Email Diigo connotea Sphinn

LinkedIn NewsVine HealthRanker Netvouz

Google DZone Meneame ThisNext

vkontakte MyShare Gwar Ratimarks

Digg Print BlinkList Upnews

Tumblr BarraPunto LinkArena eKudos

Yahoo Yigg Haohao Rec6

MySpace LinkaGoGo NuJIJ Webride

Delicious Wykop Posterous Segnalo

Pinterest blogmarks HackerNews muti

Reddit Technorati Hemidemi YahooBuzz

Live MisterWong Slashdot Kirtsy

DotNetKicks Netvibes Scoopeo

Hyves LaTafanera Mixx

social sharing: best practices to turn your users into brand ambassadors

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