How AmEx converts Facebook Likes into sales

The news that Amex is customising offers and deals based on what Facebook users and their friends ‘Like’ is – we think – an exciting glimpse of things to come for Facebook marketing.

AmEx’s new Facebook app, “Link, Like, Love”, invites users to link their cards to the unique programme and select deals. By choosing to ‘Like’ a certain retailer, for example, or even checking in at that shop’s location using Facebook Places, a user may then receive deals for that shop.

One of the most promising aspects of the programme is the way it neatly sidesteps the privacy issues of behavioural targeting. Users have to download the app, making it 100% opt-in and consensual – an intelligent evolution of social marketing.

Since it is built on AmEx’s Smart Offer APIs, which enable coupon-free offers, everybody is a winner. Customers don’t have to print off fiddly coupons, while merchants receive detailed reporting on how deals are being redeemed.

Brands have been racking their brains for some time now trying to convert Facebook Likes’ word of mouth benefits into actionable behaviour. Mashable’s report yesterday cited rapper Snoop Dogg’s novel promotional effort, in which the price of products within the fragrance line he endorses were slashed based on the number of ‘Likes’ they garnered.

Also bringing ‘Likes’ to life was Bacardi, having just hosted events in the US last month that were shaped by ‘Likes’ proposed by its Facebook fans.