Retailers Drive Black Friday/Small Biz Saturday Sales Socially

Independent retailer members of Gourmet Catalog & Buying Group participating in a brand-new social-selling platform offered by QWIQQ are gearing up for new ways to drive sales this holiday season, beginning Black Friday and Small Business Saturday.

QWIQQ is connecting participating Gourmet Catalog store members with its specialty app designed to sell merchandise directly to consumers in their communities across some of the most important and influential social media platforms – Facebook, Twitter and Foursquare. Mobile shopping will account for nearly 20 percent of this year’s anticipated $61.8 billion in holiday sales, according to QWIQQ co-founder, Jack Wrigley. 

Dallas-based QWIQQ entered into an agreement in June with Gourmet Catalog & Buying Group, the leading buying group in the housewares industry, to offer its social-selling platform and services to the group’s more than 300 independent gourmet retailer members. 

“Providing innovative new ways to sell product is important for us. QWIQQ represents a great opportunity for our members to leverage mobile and social technology, which is becoming an increasingly important aspect of the way consumers buy today,” said Janis Johnson, president and founder of Gourmet Catalog (GC) & Buying Group. “By creating an exciting marketing campaign, including Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, and other options throughout the holidays, our QWIQQ program allows GC retailers to take full advantage of technology for selling product.”

During the holiday campaign, QWIQQ provides high-impact social cover images beginning Black Friday/Small Biz Saturday through to the end of the holiday shopping season. Participating retailers can choose from three themes – cookware, gadgets and bakeware. After the sale weekend is over, QWIQQ will change the cover to “Happy Holidays,” which will remain active until the end of the holidays.

“Social and mobile selling is key, especially during the holidays. The tools QWIQQ is providing me to effectively market on social Black Friday and Small Business Saturday is terrific,” said Dave McCormick, owner of Pro Kitchen Gear. “This program is easy to use and allows me to create new revenue streams for my business while building my brand. Also, the fact I can leverage this program to enable an easy purchase on social [media platforms] yet drive the customer back into my store to pick up the item is extremely important.”

It is up to retailers to decide what merchandise they want to feature, and QWIQQ encourages retailers to offer customers special savings while delivering a hassle-free way to shop socially. The program kicked off Nov. 1, enabling participating retailers to immediately start promoting Black Friday and Small Business Saturday on their social networks. QWIQQ is supporting the program with Facebook advertising, driving special savings awareness from participating retailers.

“Customer engagement is important to us at Kitchen Window, and social media is one of the key ways we stay in touch with our customers between visits,” said Lia Huemoeller, owner of Kitchen Window. “We strive to engage our customers through our special events, our cooking schools and by featuring great products. This program allows us to engage our audience around things we are passionate about, and in doing so, create interest and demand for those products. What is great about QWIQQ is that we now have an easy way to provide a buy button so our customers can conveniently make a purchase through social media and then pick up the product in our store.”

QWIQQ, powered by a proprietary mobile application, is simple to use. Integrated into the app are PayPal’s e-commerce payment and money transfer service, and Constant Contact’s online marketing tools for small businesses, which enable QWIQQ to provide a single and dynamic solution to location-based mobile marketing for independent stores. The QWIQQ app is free and available in the iTunes App Store and the Constant Contact Marketplace.

Here’s the link to QWIQQ in iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/qwiqq-quick-easy-way-to-sell/id453258253?mt=8

Here’s the link to QWIQQ in Constant Contact: http://marketplace.constantcontact.com/Listing/applications/qwiqq/PML-17719?hp_ref=appsFree

QWIQQ will be participating in Gourmet Catalog’s Start The Year program in Atlanta, Jan. 8-9, 2014, where it will present the social-selling platform and program, and train store members.