What is Social Commerce?

Social Commerce is a fairly old practice in the field of e-commerce which enables sellers to purchase their products directly from the platform that they are using. Unlike many social media marketing gimmicks out there, which require people to redirect from one side to the other for purchasing a product, Social Commerce is way easier. It doesn't matter what business platform you're using; you will get a direct link to purchase a product, or find a ‘BUY’ button like it’s shown on Facebook.

In short, Social Commerce makes product purchasing more flexible, easy, and streamlined. There are various checkout bots, autofill options, and delivery details that enable you to buy your products in a couple of clicks.   

Benefits of Social Commerce

• Makes online shopping streamlined

Social Commerce has helped online shoppers to buy their products in the easiest way possible. As a buyer, you don’t need to click an ad, then move over to their website, add the required product into the card, fill up card details, and then proceed to order. But through this medium, you can easily go from discovery to purchase in a couple of clicks. 

You see a product appearing on your feed, if you like it, you click the buy button or the purchase link from the description and your order will be placed in no time. Thus, Social Commerce takes away the unnecessary steps and helps in the easy integration of online shopping into social media. 

•  Improve your targeted audience

Through social media, it has now become easy to gather enough information on people, and then adjust your target advertising to reach a better audience. Social Commerce enables sellers to be specific with the type of product they want to sell, and then focus on the people who seem to buy their products. 

For instance, if you want to sell your high-quality formal shirts, you need to target the audience that buys formal shirts. Such as professionals, businessmen, and so on. If you're selling beautiful invitation cards, you need to target those buyers who are involved in some event that requires invitation cards. 

• Huge potential for making money

It is no surprising fact that e-commerce is slowly taking over traditional business. You've seen the growth with your own eyes. With everything found online and can be accessed with just a few clicks, people tend to go online and buy suitable products rather than moving around the market for the same product. And this is one of the major reasons why studies suggest that the online marketing industry & M-commerce industry will reach $800 billion in the next 5 years. 

So, if you don’t want to miss out on these opportunities, you need to take action and bring your products online. Show it to the world, because people are out there who would want to buy your product at all times.   

• Improves your online commerce experience

With the help of social commerce, sellers can easily pair up with established brands or start-ups to promote their products together or buyers can easily show off their discovered products to their friends to get further insight on whether to buy the product or not. This way you can ensure a good social commerce experience. 

Popular Platforms & Channels for Social Commerce

• Instagram

According to recent research in 2020, almost 60% of people discover new and innovative products on Instagram daily. This is because Instagram shops have enabled buyers to purchase products that you see via photos and videos appearing on your feeds. 

So, if you want to step into the business with Instagram, you need to create a Facebook Shop first. Each product should have its own details, like pricing, description, and associated media. And for an easier transaction, you should set up Facebook Pay. 

Instagram them pulls this information from the Facebook catalog and features them on the Instagram app.  

• Facebook

The Facebook online marketplace is huge. There are millions of Facebook Shops throughout the platform that sells different things in different regions. This is because Facebook Shops can easily be customized whether you want to change the font, images, or colors according to your brand. You can also choose which collection to feature and what details to mention. So, if you don't have a Facebook Shop for your business, you should hurry up and create one already. 

• Snapchat

In July 2020, a 'Native Store' experience was introduced by Snapchat that enabled buyers to discover products and purchase directly from the app. This experience was backed up by Shopify and soon became a solid Social Commerce practice when influencers like Kylie Jenner and Kim Kardashian were approved of this beta feature. 

• Pinterest

For the time being, Pinterest does not allow sellers to sell their items directly through the Pinterest interface. It does not have an option to create 'Product Pins' or purchase ability like on Instagram or Facebook. So, you can say Pinterest is not actually a tool for purely Social Commerce. When you click on a product on Pinterest, you will be redirected to the merchant site where you'll be able to purchase the product. 

Ignoring these restrictions, there are almost 90% of buyers who use Pinterest for shopping inspirations. 

• WhatsApp Shopping

Recently WhatsApp introduced the 'WhatsApp Cart' feature. Through this feature, buyers can select multiple items from the product catalog and send the message to the merchant which will be delivered to you through suitable means.  

Tips To Reach Your Target Customer Through Social Media Platforms

• Follower engagement

This is a necessary step towards growing your Social Commerce business. Just throwing up products, collections, or catalogs along with the purchase options isn't enough. You need to build relations with your followers. You need to answer their queries, offer value to your followers, guide them through their shopping experience, and more. This will ensure that your followers keep growing and so do your product sales. 

• Promote ratings and reviews

In this virtual world, neither you, not your followers know or trust you personally. And this is the same with your products. So, when a customer purchases your product and uses it properly, ask them to rate your product and provide helpful feedback. This will help you build a trustable brand where people can come and go through your products. They could also read through these reviews or check the ratings to judge your product quality. 

• Price your products properly

When you're targeting customers in this virtual environment you must keep the prices in an affordable range. No one is looking to buy luxury here and neither is anyone looking to spend a ton of money on a product that they wouldn't trust more than a few hundred bucks. 

According to many e-commerce sites, a price tag that ranges between $50 to $100 is ideal considering products such as clothes, toys, pottery, and so on. 

• Target your preferable audience

When you have a lot of data available on your hands, you need to utilize it properly. Use this information to find out which region your product is popular in, which type of customers should you target, and what type of pricing should you keep to attract more customers. 

• Set up monitoring options

Now that you've set your Social Commerce campaigns and ads, you need to take the time and analyze its outcome. Whether it is targeting the right audience or not, what type of feedback you're getting from your customers, and so on. 

Conclusion 

Like any other online marketing practice, Social Commerce is also a piece of the puzzle in this virtual world. To make it work efficiently, you need to derive robust strategies, engage with your followers, learn how to promote your products, learn social media skills, and many more. Only through in-depth exploring and continuous practice can you hope to improve and move ahead of the competitors around you. Hiring an e-commerce development services would be a great option. It can help you in increasing the ROI of your eCommerce business.