Hermes uses Facebook advertising to fuel web traffic

[POSTMAN]

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Parcel delivery firm Hermes, formerly Parcelnet, says traffic to its new Consumer to Consumer (C2C) online service is growing steadily as a result of advertising on social networking websites.

Using http://www.myhermes.co.uk" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;, which launched in May, customers selling goods via the internet can have Hermes collect goods from their house and deliver them to the buyer. The group's CEO Carole Woodhead tells Roadtransport.com the site hopes to tap into the C2C market for online retailers, which she says is currently 95% dominated by the Royal Mail.

A Hermes spokesman says: "The number of hits is increasing week on week and highlights include an MSN homepage takeover - 40,000 hits on one Saturday. Considering the service is online, it made sense for us to avoid some traditional media and advertise online instead."

The firm says it has experienced a steady increase in traffic directly from Facebook, eBay and MSN advertising. It also claims that sales volumes have been doubling week on week, although no figures are provided. The spokesman adds: "We will review a second phase of advertising before Christmas to see if there are new online advertising resources we can tap into."

[andy2007]

Now that's a good idea: Using Social Networking to improve business. I know that The Post Office tried this, but why not start doing the same for Royal Mail, and Parcel Force too?