Electronic Commerce to Social Commerce: Where India stands?

We are witnessing exponential growth in number of users adding to various social media networks. According to an article , by 2012, India would be home to the second largest number of users of Facebook and among top five for Google+ users. By 2015, 8 per cent of the total ecommerce will be on mobile phones. These statistics creates inevitable demand to boost social commerce in present Indian market.

What is Social Commerce ?
 Social commerce is a subset of electronic commerce that involves using social media, online media that supports social interaction and user contributions, to assist in the online buying and selling of products and services. (wikipedia)
Social commerce term was first used by yahoo in a blog in 2005
Social commerce will be the talk of the town  as it converts word of mouth marketing in to viral marketing to some extent because it creates compounding effect on social platforms through active engagement of users giving product reviews, sharing pick lists, giving recommendations etc.

Social Commerce in India. Are we ready?
Social commerce is at nascent stage in India. Websites like Snapdeal and Mydala are the examples of social commerce sites which are harnessing the potential of social commerce. Today's Indian consumer is smart enough to understand marketing and its gimmicks. Traditional media is playing its role but to influence the actual purchase we need to implement social commerce sooner or later.
No doubt, social commerce will be the integral part of marketing strategies in future and hopefully every organizations will include social commerce in their marketing agenda.

Your inputs are welcome
Dharmendra Pandey