Not long ago, social commerce was merely an abstract concept with a questionable future in eCommerce. Now, nearly every retailer knows that engaging online consumers is an essential part of business. Companies are eager to start the conversation with their customers and get the customers talking to each other.

PowerReviews was founded in 2005 by Andrew Chen and Robert Chea and is now considered to be a leading provider of social commerce solutions. The company has helped hundreds of retailers engage customers and build communities online. Internet Retailer included the company in 2009’s Top 500 Solutions Winner. Sites such as RadioShack, Diapers.com, TicketsNow, and Orbitz and many more are using customer reviews systems provided by PowerReviews.

A few weeks ago we posted about the new PayPal Labs program and widgets for Facebook and MySpace. Yesterday, PayPal officially launched their Storefront Widget Beta. These widgets allow users to embed virtual PayPal storefronts into blogs, sites, social profiles and anywhere else where HTML can be embedded in the code.

Basically, blog, site or profile shoppers select products or items from the widget to add into the shopping cart, then they checkout and pay using PayPal. The idea for storefront widgets was suggested by PayPal users as a way for them to sell easily from MySpace profiles, Facebook profiles and more (Note: At this time, the PayPal Storefront is not available for MySpace, you can get notified when it is by clicking here).

If you are a blogger who regularly uses MyBlogLog, you may have noticed a posting on their blog and site about a contest they recently started called, the MyBlogLog Problogger Contest. Their blog also featured a post about the contest which, in my opinion, does a better job explaining the details of the contest than the page on MBL. The MBL contest is for the bloggers who grow their communities on MBL the most from November 8th to the 30th, meaning the blogs with the most new community members will complete for the top prizes. Some of the prizes include a One Year Pro MyBlogLog Subscription and a $500.00 Yahoo Search Marketing Credit, among others.

We can’t promise that you’ll become a problogger, but we can get you started on the right path. Enter our ‘Become a Problogger Contest’ for a chance to win a prize package that will give you the TOOLS to help get you on the way to success. Good luck!

Pronto.com recently made a couple of big announcements regarding their comparison shopping engine and social shopping community. The first is the addition of brand new product buying guides into their social community. The new guides are supposed to compliment features that are already included in the social shopping sections. The other announcement involves a contest Pronto is having called the Holiday Shopping Contest where contestants have a chance to win $2,000 in products from Pronto.com.

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past two years, you’ve most likely registered an account with or have heard of Facebook. If you haven’t heard of or used Facebook, you should know it’s basically a social networking site that was originally developed for college or university students. Now Facebook has grown far beyond just student users and now hold one of the top positions in their niche and continues to be one of the most visited and used sites in existence today.

Ok, now that the history lesson is out of the way, we can jump into the article topic, new Facebook Ads. On Tuesday, during the Facebook Social Advertising event (where more than 250 marketing and advertising executives gathered in New York), the MySpace killer unveiled their new ad system called Facebook Ads. The social advertising system will allow businesses and entrepreneurs to connect with a wide range of users and target advertising or media to the exact audiences the business needs to attract (it’s basically a BIG word of mouth system for businesses and also for users to find new things). The new Faccebook Ads are designed to show users new businesses, brands and products through their personal networks and the trusted referrals of their friends.

The holidays always remind me of all the unique marketing strategies eCommerce companies come up with for their specific holiday or event promotions, seasonal linkbait and other cool holiday specific ideas. We often report on eTail promotional efforts specifically related to seasons, holidays or events surrounding a time of celebration or remembrance. In September, for instance, we posted about how Walmart used Facebook and how PayPal used TheFind.com for their unique back-to-school promotional efforts.

Back-to-school season is over and it’s Halloween time now, so what better way to get into the spirit than to point out some of the trendy and unique ideas that other companies and eTailers are using to leverage linkers, social media and site traffic towards their seasonal campaigns or holiday promotions.

A heads up to all social media marketing fanatics! Tomorrow there is going to be a Webinar, featuring Neil Patel, on ElasticPath’s eCommerce blog.

Here’s the details and a link to register for the event. Space is limited, so sign up right now!

The Secret of Social Media Marketing for Online Retailers
Featuring Neil Patel, CTO, Advantage Consulting Services
Wednesday, October 10, 2007 9:00 AM – 10:00 AM PDT

Shop.com has recently introduced several new features to their shopping portal and platform including a new shopping lifestyle blog (The Shopping Vine), a Facebook shopping application and gift registries for multiple stores. Shop.com hopes the new features will give customers more ways to shop and exchange information Online.

ShopLocal recently bulked up their feature offering by adding in social community and networking capabilities for their users. The new social features include a profile page and the ability to search various product reviews, join community discussions on their Hot Deals and even track prices. The users profile can then be shared with the rest of the ShopLocal community.

Once a user has signed up for their free profile account, they simply login to begin personalizing their ShopLocal profile and personal shopping experience. Community members then use their account to share deals, promotions, rebates, coupons, reviews and more within the network of users. In addition, ShopLocal members can get Price Alerts that inform shoppers when products they are interested in are available at a price specified by the user.