Press Room

Viewpoints Acquisition of Ecoscene Covered in Crain's Chicago Business

 
 

Thanks to Lisa Bertgnoli of Crain's Chicago Business for her coverage today of Viewpoints' acquisition of Ecoscene, a Chicago-based green reviews website. Lisa's an old friend to Ecoscene and its founder Aimee Heilbrunn and we're pleased to have gotten the opportunity to spend some time talking to her about the acquisition as well as the Viewpoints business and our rapid growth this past year. Read Lisa's article here. 

Sears Community & VTP Social Loyalty Engine Featured in Retail TouchPoints

Amanda Ferrante from Retail TouchPoints just released an article featuring Viewpoints' Social Loyalty Engine and Sears' MySears community in an article discussing the need for retail brands to look for solutions to integrate their loyalty programs with their social media communities. Amanda writes that fans and followers on social networks doesn't necessarily lead to active sales, so brands need to establish CRM strategies that motivate customers to contribute content and become leaders and brand advocates in the brand's online community and across the social web. 

From the article: "Sears is leveraging the ViewPoints Social Loyalty Engine, by creating customer communities for its Sears and K-Mart brands with a point-based approach to give customers something to socialize about. For its MySears and MyKmart communities, the retailers use incentives to drive review writing and other forms of activity, with each earning a “status” of “ViP,” “Advisor,” “Writer,” “Reviewer,” or “Contributor.” Community members can also earn points for basic actions like becoming a member, uploading a profile photo, or posting a forum discussion.

Taking a different approach from traditional loyalty programs that reward consumers on the number or size of their purchases, the Viewpoints Social Loyalty Engine recognizes the value of consumers’ overall engagement, through their reviews, discussions, comments and blog posts. The Social Loyalty Engine measure’s a consumer’s overall impact on a brand’s image through the positive word of mouth recommendations they generate."

Read the rest of the article

Retail Customer Experience Features the MySears Community

1/12/10 

Four ways to get online shoppers to contribute reviews

James Bickers recently completed a nice profile article on the MySears community after talking to Rob Harles from SHC and me.  It's great to see Sears getting more media recognition for MySears and their overall community strategy. 

James also discusses the growth and value of consumer-generated reviews. He writes, "Online reviews, which once gave brand managers and marketing executives stomachaches, is now pervasive, and becoming more important with each passing day. According to a recent Nielsen study, 70 percent of shoppers said they trust consumer opinions posted on retail websites."

Read the full article

 

WSJ Acknowledges the Viewpoints Technology Platform

 

Viewpoints' has been generating a lot of media coverage lately! Nice acknowledgement of the Viewpoints Technology Platform from Geoff Fowler of the Wall Street Journal this week in his article focused on Sears' online growth strategies. Here's a snippet from the article:

>>Sears has also been tapping into the power of social-networking sites as a way to drive sales and win customer loyalty. With the help of industry veterans at a Chicago company called Viewpoints Network, in the spring it launched sites called MySears.com and MyKmart.com. Combined, the sites now have 400,000 registered users.<<

Read the entire article

Chicago Sun-Times Movers & Shakers

 

November 30, 2009...Brad Spirrison from the Chicago Sun-Times included recent Viewpoints executive appointments John D. Thomas and Ken Obel in today's "Movers & Shakers". Read the column

1to1 Weekly Magazine - Sears Builds Social Loyalty

 
By Jeremy Nedelaka

1to1 Magazine's Jeremy Nedelka wrote a great article highlighting Sears' strategy behind the MySearsand MyKmart communiites in today's 1to1 Weekly. He talks about how their keen focus on engaging their customers and creating an opportunity for dialogue is why Sears' communiites will survive where so many others have failed.

From the article: Online communities are notoriously hit-or-miss, for a variety of reasons. The lack of engaging features or personalization, no sense of belonging, or too much promotion are just some of the reasons customers visit sites once and never return. Sears created its communities with an emphasis on engagement, recognition, and dialogue to avoid joining the list of orphaned online retail communities.

"The genesis for us was that we need to get to know our customers better, so we wanted to get people talking [to] better understand their motivations," says Rob Harles, Sears Holding Corp's vice president of community. "We didn't really do any promotion; we used our online point of sale to tell customers about the site and ask for their feedback."

The MySears.comand MyKmart.com communities contain customer reviews, discussion boards, consumer guides, and access to coupons. The sites, powered by Viewpoints Network, have 330,000 registered members and attract 1.3 million monthly visitors, more than half of whom come from organic search, according to Harles.

October 26, 2009

Read the entire article

Illinois Technology Association Interviews Matt Moog

This week the Illinois Technology Associated (ITA) featured Viewpoints in their monthly newsletter. Check out an exerpt from the Q&A interview below.     ITA Member Q&A: Viewpoints Network

Illinois Technology Association: In 10 words or less, what problem does Viewpoints solve for your clients? Matt Moog: Viewpoints companies engage with their customers using social technology. ITA: What motivated you to join (or start-up) Viewpoints? What is the origin of the name? MM: The social web and search are two macro trends that are driving how people use the Internet to make decisions.  They use search to find the exact information they are looking for and they rely on the advice of people like them to help them make informed decisions.  By providing a social platform for reviews, blogs, discussion forums, answers all organized around product catalogs and business directories Viewpoints is able to fulfill its mission of helping consumers make smarter decisions. ITA: How does Viewpoints differentiate from its competitors? MM: The Viewpoints Technology Platform powers both Viewpoints.com and other private label communities for our customers. We compete both in the consumer internet space against other review sites such as Yelp, TripAdvisor, CNet and Consumer Reports.   In the consumer market we have a more social platform that also covers the broadest range of categories.  In our business to business service, we are the only provider who combines reviews with a social/community platform and a very strong search engine optimization toolset.  We compete with companies such as BazaarVoice, PowerReviews, Pluck and Lithium. Read the complete interview.

BizReport covers Viewpoints In-line Integration news

Viewpoints Technology Integrates Community, Ecommerce by Kristina Knight

Nice coverage by Kristina Knight from BizReport.com of our new inline integration announcement that we made this week at the 2009 shop.org Annual Conference in Vegas.

 Here's a quick snippet: If you're looking for another way to engage consumers with brand, consider integrating a community site with your existing ecommerce site. Too hard? A new platform from Viewpoints Technology helps brands integrate community with ecommerce so that consumers receive a more seamless user experience.

Read the full story here

Entrepreneur.com reviews Viewpoints.com

Another good review of Viewpoints... my favorite quote:

"When I review resorts on TripAdvisor, I always look for recent reviews from people who are from New York. Why? Because I’m from New York and I know New Yorkers have a reputation for never settling for less than stellar treatment. So, I automatically place less weight on a review written by someone in Montana than I do on one written by someone in New York. (Yes, the person in Montana could be from New York, but we’re not going there today, ok?)

That’s what Viewpoints.com does automatically. It let’s you read reviews from people who have things in common with you (or not, if that’s your preference) so that you can really get the full scoop from someone who shares your same situation, preferences and even values. Who knew!?"

Mashable - The Social Networking Blog Weighs In

Mashable, a well read blog that focuses on Social Networking recently did a quick write up about the official launch of Viewpoints.com and commented on our relationship with Orbitz. Click here to read the full post.

A few of my favorite quotes are:

Viewpoints has built up a significant amount of information on its users, as it asks for things like a two-word description of yourself when you leave reviews. This amassed data has contributed to one of Viewpoints’ major upgrades that’s being announced with this release–its improved search engine and filtering options. You can search for reviews based on the type of user you’d like to find. So if that type of user happens to be a fanciful, garden-loving finance expert, you’re more likely to find the type of person that could offer you the most valuable reviews. This all ties into Viewpoints’ existing system of tracking points (tips) left on the site, a user’s trust score, etc.

And also this one:

Viewpoints biggest announcement however, is its partnership with Orbitz. Now Orbitz hotel reviews will be syndicated on Viewpoints , offering you access to nearly 20,000 hotels, directly through this peer-review site