Retailers and marketers were an important part of social media's strong growth in 2010.  And eMarketer is suggesting that this year retailers will take the next step and move "beyond simply offering Facebook pages and Twitter profiles for their customers to follow."  So what might that next step be?  For many companies, it could be "social sign-on."  From eMarketer:

Social sign-on gives retailers access to rich profile information for targeting customers.

“Bringing Facebook profile data into retail sites makes sense because it influences consumers when they are close to conversion,” said Jeffrey Grau, eMarketer principal analyst and author of the new report “Social Commerce: Personalized and Collaborative Shopping Experiences.” “In contrast, many consumers on Facebook are mainly socializing with friends and further removed from making purchase decisions.”

Over half of online retailers who responded to an August 2010 survey by Gigya, a provider of social sign-on applications, had either implemented the feature or planned to add it in the near future.

Read The Future of Social Shopping here.