What was the inspiration behind
creating inSparq?
Startups like Fab, Gilt and Rent the Runway
have been using social commerce strategies to
make their sites more sticky and to drive
referrals. Traditional retailers were looking to
implement similar solutions, but didn’t
necessarily have the technical expertise. is is
why we built inSparq.
We started the company by building a Sharing +
Rewards product to drive virality on retailer
sites. It was incredibly successful with more
than one thousand sites installing the sharing
widget. We then realized our real asset was our
social data and using this activity to highlight
and recommend products to shoppers. Aer
speaking with customers about their needs, we
built the Trending Products Feed as a solution
for improving product discovery and making
ecommerce sites more dynamic. e initial
results from this product speak for themselves
-- 2X improvement in conversion and 3X li in
social actions from the ecommerce site.
retailers are now seeing the benefit of social merchandising solutions and are looking to jump in.
At inSparq, we are interested in making online shopping as fun, as engaging and as sticky as offline
commerce. Of course, we think social is the key ingredient for doing so. Social has long proven to be great
for cost effective customer referrals, but that’s not its only benefit. Social also has the added benefit of
capturing customers interests and desires. If this data is used for merchandising, the implications are very
powerful.
e inSparq Trending Products Feed shows what’s trending on the site in real-time, essentially
recommending products based on customer driven trends. e Feed helps customers discover new
products, share their favorite products and validate purchase decisions. And, the solution works — retailers
are seeing click through rates of over 15% and conversion rates on the Trending Products Feed are more
than two times higher than the retailer site overall. ese solutions work on any ecommerce store so that
emerging retailers like Lolly Wolly Doodle can create the same social shopping experience as startups like
Fab. You can see the experience live on www.lollywollydoodle.com/pages/feed.
How do you see social shopping evolving?
Retailers are already looking for unique and innovative third-party solutions to transform the social
shopping experience. Previously retailers tried opening stores on social networks like Facebook. Now, it’s all
about connecting customers on their existing ecommerce shop.
We see more and more traditional retailers embracing social strategies and leveraging social to more
effectively merchandise products to their customers -- it’s natural evolution.
What does the future hold for inSparq?
We think dynamic merchandising and product
discovery are driving the next wave of
innovations in retail and we’re excited to help
retailers embrace this wave.
inSparq has a bright future ahead. Retailers are starting to see the importance of social merchandising -- we
are getting more and more inbound demand as a result.
What do you think has lead to the
movement of social shopping?
We are building new products based on this demand and will be rolling out mobile optimization, opening
up our API and experimenting with campaign based promotions inside our Trending Products Feed. Our
technology is evolving to stay aligned with our mission to improve product discovery and social engagement
for major retailers.
Social shopping is dynamically reshaping the
ecommerce space as more and more sales move
from offline to online. People are naturally
social and offline shopping has always been a
social experience. As shopping shis to online,
customers are naturally gravitating to sites that
are social.
To date, most of the social innovation has come
from startups like Fab, Gilt and Rent the
Runway. ese startups were looking for ways
to ܛ