Nestle Pilots Social Commerce With New Interactive Site
Nestle has launched a new, interactive online social commerce platform in Germany to engage with consumers while providing greater access to its products. The Nestle Marketplace (Marktplatz) website – a pilot venture for the company – is the first social commerce platform of its kind in Germany from a food and beverage manufacturer of Nestle’s size and range.
Consumers will not only have the opportunity to purchase products from Nestle’s German portfolio online, but also to rate, comment on and ask questions about each one.
People can share their recipe tips and suggestions directly and can also submit their ideas for new Nestle products and packaging, a selection of which will be posted on the site.
With more than 1,500 products and 72 different brands available online, Nestle Germany expects around three million visits to the platform within the first year.
Gerhard Berssenbrugge, chief executive of Nestle Germany, explains: “We are encouraging two-way communication with consumers; allowing them to tell us what they like, but also what they think we could improve. We want to be inspired by people’s ideas and to enable them to take an active part in helping us shape not only the future of the Nestle Marketplace, but also of our products.”
Within the platform’s offering are around 100 foreign Nestle products that cannot be bought through traditional German retail channels, such as Baci Perugina chocolate pralines from Italy and extra-spicy Maggi chilli sauce from Malaysia.
These will be available alongside local best sellers and seasonal and speciality offers, as well as entirely new products and innovations not yet on commercial sale.
“Every fourth person in Germany makes food purchases on the Internet, while around 1.5 billion Google searches here relate to the food sector,” adds Gerhard Berssenbrugge. “By the end of this year, online sales of food and beverages in Germany are expected to exceed Eur500 million, so it is clearly an important area where we have a real opportunity to engage with consumers.”
