Hearst Intersecting Commerce, Social Media

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Hearst Magazines Digital Media will partner with Buddy Media, a Facebook management system, to launch a social platform across a network of Hearst branded titles.

 

The Hearst branded social media applications—or ‘sapplets’ as the publisher is calling them—will give title advertisers another outlet for customization, sponsorship and brand recognition.

 

The sapplets will extend content both from participating brand sponsors and publication editorial teams through social media, according to a spokesman for Buddy Media.

 

“The unique set of sapplets will bring online social communities together and create scale and synergy for Hearst clients. As a result, the enormous global network of Facebook members will become more engaged with our branded content and have the ability to share interactions, recommend favorite products and much more,” says Kristine Welker, chief revenue officer for Hearst Magazines Digital Media, in a statement. 

 

Beginning in July, the Facebook pages of Cosmopolitan, Seventeen, Redbook, Marie Claire and RealBeauty.com will have several new social applications from Buddy Media.

 

A “Vote For Your Favorite” tool enables customers to vote up or down multi-media branded assets, such as products and user generated content as well as brand videos.

 

Additionally, an interactive “personality” boutique will also be available, which is a recommendation tool that suggests products from the editorial side of Hearst as well as its advertisers based on a user’s answers to a personality quiz. Users can explore the recommended products, as well as products recommended for other users and then click to purchase.

 

Site visitors can earn badges for engaging with content on an advertiser’s custom tab—like taking a quiz or posting something—that can then be shared on their wall.

 

As consumers engage with these sapplets their activity is shared through their network of friends to increase awareness and interaction of the program.

 

Hearst also recently unveiled a partnership with Pixazza Inc. to increase user interaction with images that provide e-commerce platforms.

 

Redbookmag.com is apart of this new e-commerce initiative with Pixazza’s technology, as well as HouseBeautiful.com. These sites’ advertisements will utilizes Pixazza’s services—the company asserts the technology is designed for the “use of images as real estate for brand advertising and e-commerce.”’

 

Pixazza’s Web site provides an example of the content, it shows an advertisement of a young woman riding a bicycle and holding a black umbrella. When a user moves their mouse over the woman’s umbrella, shoes or dress, she has the option to click to purchase the exact item featured in the ad.

 

Hearst sponsors will be featured in the selected images Pixazza will provide to the company. “At this point, the technology is being tested extensively on Redbookmag.com and HouseBeautiful.com, and we are working to identify other partners to work with across our portfolio of sites,” Welker says. 

 

“I think what you’re going to find is content companies are going to move into commerce,” David Carey, president of Hearst Magazines, commented at the Bloomberg Media Summit in March. “It’s a service to the reader that they can just click…and be able to buy it.” 

 

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