Early in 2019 we will make the first version of our advocacy platform available to you, our clients. It is an easy-to-use collection of web apps that will give you an unprecedented level of detail about the activity of experts engaging with your brand in the ExpertVoice community. The first three apps we are releasing are Analytics, for detailed reporting on campaign performance, Products, where you can see what experts are saying about your products, and Content, where you can manage the UGC that experts are tagging with your brand.
The Analytics app replaces AnalyticsWeb, the current tool for campaign reporting. It’s a report library with customizable dashboards that you can use to create a personalized reporting environment to suit your specific needs. You can use sophisticated filtering to zero in on exactly the information you need, and then save those filtered views to use them again later. The Analytics app can also bring this information directly to you through email subscriptions and alerts that can trigger when certain events happen, like sales exceeding an important threshold. Watch this video to take a tour of the Analytics app.
The Products app allows you to view and manage a significant addition to the ExpertVoice platform: the expert recommendation. ExpertVoice has always been about improving the verbal recommendations made by retail sales associates, industry pros, and other people sought out for product advice. We would like to take the benefits of recommendations beyond word-of-mouth, so, earlier this year, we started collecting digital product recommendations on ExpertVoice. Each recommendation includes a “likelihood to recommend” rating for the product, a text description of why the expert recommends the product and for whom, and optionally, pictures that relate to the recommendation.
Experts have created tens of thousands of recommendations for our clients who have hosted stores on the ExpertVoice platform. The Products app gives you a convenient way to view and sort them, and the ability to upvote and reply to recommendations directly from the advocacy platform. These interactions will then appear as coming from the brand, opening up a two way conversation between you and the experts who are passionate about your brand. Watch how the Product app works here.
The Content app gives you the long-awaited ability to easily view and manage the pictures that experts upload and tag with your brand. You can sort the pictures, view previews, organize them in albums, and download high fidelity versions of the images. You have the rights to use these pictures in marketing materials, but we suggest contacting experts before making them famous on Times Square or in a SuperBowl ad. Catch a sneak peek of the Content app here.
We announced and demonstrated early versions of these apps at the Expert Effect Summit in August. Soon after that we launched a beta program, since then, more than 30 clients have been using the apps. We are extremely grateful for the detailed feedback we have received. The new advocacy platform is a lot better as a result of this input.
It was exciting to see all the opportunities that clients see in the new apps. Many clients are interested in using recommendations as online testimonials in their ecommerce experiences. One client said they had been investing in their pro deals program for a long time, and these recommendations make the return on that investment very tangible. Some of our clients saw the UGC tagged with their brands for the first time, and were blown away by the quality of the content and how compelling it was to see their products in use by experts.
A heartfelt thank you to all those who participated in the beta, and to the ExpertVoice team who worked hard to get the advocacy platform ready. We can’t wait to get it to all of our clients early in 2019. Of course, there is so much more we can do to make the advocacy platform more useful, and we’re excited to work on that together. If you would like to talk to us about the new advocacy platform, we’d love to hear from you. Please contact your account executive or customer success representative.
