Borders Group as in Borders Books, launched a new web site with social networking site Gather.com, where Borders’ books, movies and music customers can earn loyalty points good toward purchases or cash by sharing personal content online and participating in online forums.

The new site, Borders.Gather.com, is designed to let Borders shoppers participate in existing discussion groups about particular books and other media, but also to upload personal content such as photos and book reviews or to start their own online book club.

Read more about how the social network can benefit you.

In other Social Networking News

Executives Must Realize and Learn the Power of Social Media

Senior marketing executives in several countries agree that the use of social media for corporate, brand and product marketing is not a passing fad, according to research sponsored by TNS media intelligence/Cymfony. In fact, nearly 50% believe it is a vital component of corporate communications that should be monitored at the executive level and allocated significant resources.

The responses of the marketing executives surveyed show that companies are taking social media seriously. Beyond the need for C-level support, another 30% see social media as an unconventional new opportunity that businesses must grasp with a sense of urgency. In addition, 95% believe social media will grow in significance over the next five years. When asked about the uses of social media, respondents endorsed it as a strategic tool to gain consumer insights (37%), build brand awareness (21%) and increase customer loyalty (18%).

SEO & Social Media Marketing
Barry has a great coverage on the SMX West Conference. Rand Fishkin, CEO of SEOmoz says you need to ask what are the goals of online marketing? Rand replies: web site traffic, growing brand awareness, biz development. Social media can help with all these things. By interacting with the participatory communities on the web. You can create and promote viral content with social media. One method is Leveraging UGC sites for technical goals. Reach key influencers via blogs and social news portals.

Neil Patel, CTO, Advantage Consulting Services shared a case study about American Greetings who did a viral halloween e-card contest by putting a dog head on a human body. American Greetings now ranks well for halloween cards in Google.

Barbara Boser, Social Media Director, 3 Dog Media tells how to be a top stumbler and top digger.

Michael Gray, President, Atlas Web Services gives Twenty Twitter Tips on Marketing, Sales and Traffic

Read Jolina’s Tips on Social Media Marketing at Lee’s Onlne Marketing Blog.

Localeze is a Chicago-based local search company that was stablished in 2003, and specializes in connecting consumers with local merchants through online content collection, enhancement, and distribution.

Gordon most recently served as vice president of worldwide sales at Innovectra Corp., where he was a member of the senior management team responsible for sales growth and partnership development. Before that he held positions at Artesia Technologies, TeleBright Corp. and Edify Corp.

“Andy has decades of experience helping customers and channel partners leverage advanced interactive services,” says Localeze general manager Jeff Beard. “He will offer local merchants and national brands the high level of service they deserve, while helping them dramatically boost their findability in local searches. We`re delighted to have him on board.”

Localeze is a subsidiary of Chicago-based Targusinfo.

This will be a great networking event as well. There’s no better place to hob knob with some of the best and brightest Search Enginie Optimization (SEO), Social media optimization (SMO), Affiliate Marketing and Press Release experts in the internet marketing industry.

Special Thanks goes to Jeff Harrington owner of Harrington Graphic Design Services and Stephanie with the PGA Tour for all their help in organizing this fantastic event.

Early indications are that the online holiday shopping season (Black Friday, Cyber Monday) is off to a strong start. Analysts note, however, that retailers, online and off, pushed promotions aggressively over the past few days, raising questions whether the strong sales can be sustained, reports Internet Retailer.

“Sales Rocked” said Jeffrey Wolfe, chief operating officer and CFO at Moosejaw Mountaineering. Wolfe says online sales were up 70% over last year, making it the biggest sales day ever for the e-commerce site crediting the increase to an e-mail marketing campaign that was very personalized and highly targeted promotions based on buying and browsing history.

Ice.com boosted sales by 82% over last year by using aggressive marketing strategies that included getting affiliates fired up about the day, which resulted in 7,000 affiliates downloading Ice.com’s banner for Cyber Monday deals. Additionally, Ice.com’s offered 20% off and free earrings to every 100th customer shopping the site that day, advertising deals on MSN and AOL that were focused on Cyber Monday.

Sales at BabyAge.com on Monday were up 231% over the same Monday a year ago due to “a concerted effort this year to develop specials for Black Friday and Cyber Monday,” says president Jack Kiefer.

Sucharita Mulpuru of Forrester Research says the aggressive discounting is part of the reason the numbers were as strong as they were. “So far, so good”, says Mulpuru, and “the strength of the season will depend on whether the momentum is maintained regardless of discounting in the coming weeks.”

Patti Freeman Evans of JupiterResearch points out that more than 500 retailers posted special deals on the CyberMonday.com site hosted by online retailer organization Shop.org, a unit of the National Retail Federation, compared to a few hundred last year. Traffic to that site Cyber Monday was five times higher than last year, 1.5 million unique visitors vs. 300,000, Shop.org reported.

Comparison Shopping Soars; Amazon, Wal-Mart Still Dominate E-Tail
November 9, 2007

About 56 percent more comparison shopping inquiries were the made the first week of November this year compared with the same week last year, according to new figures released this week from Web traffic tracker Hitwise.

Hitwise reports that the top price-comparison sites were

• Yahoo Shopping 20 %
• Smarter.com 15 %
• Bizrate 14 %

The top retailers who enjoyed the traffic from those sites were Amazon, eBay, Target, Overstock.com, Wal-Mart and JCPenney.

Shopzilla experienced the biggest increase in traffic among visitors aged 45-plus, with a 58 percent gain for the week ending Nov. 3, 2007, compared to the same week last year. NexTag saw a 48 percent increase in traffic while YahooShopping received a 46 percent increase for the same week.

Historic Cyber Monday and Black Friday Facts & News

Cyber Monday Breaks Records
November 29, 2006

In the world of e-commerce, the Monday after Thanksgiving is referred to as Cyber Monday. As the first workday after the long weekend, it’s expected to be big for online retail, with Internet-connected employees get to their holiday shopping.

In 2006, Cyber Monday once again saw the highest unique audience of any day so far last holiday season with 29.5 million unique visits to Nielsen//NetRatings Holiday eShopping Index.
Sixteen million of those visits came from the workplace, Neilsen//NetRatings said. That’s up 7 percent over last year. Of that, eBay, Amazon and Wal-Mart again took the top three spots, drawing 5.6 million, 4.2 million and 2.5 million unique visitors, respectively.

The top shopping search engine was Shopzilla.com with 959,000 unique visitors.

Customer spending on Cyber Monday totaled $608 million, up 26 percent versus the same day last year, according to comScore.

E-Commerce Makes Hay on Black Friday
November 27, 2006

eBay led the top online shopping destinations on Black Friday with 7.5 million unique visitors.
Amazon and Wal-Mart Stores followed with 3.4 million and 3.2 million unique visitors, respectively.
That Black Friday bump was evident across e-commerce, but week-over-week growth was particularly strong for consumer electronics, Nielsen//NetRatings said.
According to Web research firm CoreMetrics, Cyber Monday,” will see the highest traffic this season
and next Monday, Dec. 4, will yield the most sales for Internet commerce.

Study: One in Three to Brave Black Friday

• 34% Plan to shop in stores on Black Friday day after Thanksgiving
  
• 61% Plan to avoid stores
  
• Of those planning to stay away from the malls, 10 percent used words like “crazy,” “madhouse,” “hectic,” and “insane” to describe the experience.
  
• 77% cite shopping for good deals on gifts, low prices and bargins as the reason they shop in stores that day.
  
• 9% shopped that day because of tradition (this was the second most popular reason for Black Friday shopping).

The Top stores people plan to shop