This isn’t about social media, it’s just something that strikes me odd

Target sent me an email with a great headline – they were having “the biggest iPod sale of the season. My 2nd generation Nano is getting a bit long in the tooth and I’ve been thinking about replacing it, but haven’t had the motivation. In my world, a price reduction can be very motivating (I hate paying retail prices).

So I clicked on the link that took me to the iPod Touch page. If I’m going to replace my little 2GB Nano, I figured I do it in style. Upon arrival I was presented with thee choices of 3rd gen Touches; 8GB, 16GB and 32GB. Each had the retail price displayed with a lovely red line running through it. Below each was a link that read “see low price.”

What is the deal with that?

I’m from the school that says your visitors should be required to click as few times as necessary to reach their destination. Unless Target was having one hell of a sale – 30% off or more – there is no reason to hide the price.  In this case it was 8% on the 8GB and 10% on each of the others. It was opening a Christmas present to find you aunt knitted you a 3 armed sweater.

By no means is Target the only retailer doing this. I’ve seen the same practice from other online retailers. What prompted me to post about it, however, is that iPods rarely go on sale and I was really hoping to score a Bonanza (that’s what my friends and I called a great find when we rifled through the Rag Stock bins in the 80’s. That was when the only Rag Stock store was a dusty warehouse in DT Mpls.). I’m sure there’s a really good reason, based on all kinds of psychoanalytical studies of buying behaviors, retailers feel the need to hide “special” prices from consumers. But here’s a piece of advice from this consumer..

KNOCK IT OFF!

Is it more natural to use social media tactics in the B2B space or B2C?

I originally asked this question in the B2B Social Media group at LinkedIn and got some great responses. I figured I’d throw it out to a, hopefully, wider audience.

I was meeting with a representative from an ad agency that deals primarily with consumer packaged goods and, in a grass is always greener moment, he said they are struggling to implement social media tactics for their customers. He said it – social media – seems a much better fit for B2B. I found his comments interesting because I’ve sat on a couple panels, and attended others, where the main question has been whether there is a place for SM in the B2B world.

So I’d like you to put on your hats of objectivity and give your thoughts on which is a more natural couple: B2B and social media or B2C and social media.

I’d love to hear your opinion.