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The mechanics of commerce has changed throughout history and are influenced by various factors. Perhaps the second most influential of those factors is the continuous advancement of technology. Nowadays, businesses can sell their products online on either their websites or social platforms.
If you want to enter the online arena, social commerce is an effective way to do so. Social commerce is when a business uses social media platforms to make a more personalized and targeted shopping experience for their customers.
In other words, your business promotes and sells your items on social media for users to see and purchase. In this way you will increase your audience, reach and revenue, as Design Wizard explains in its interesting post on Types of Social Media & How to Leverage Them For Your Business (don’t miss it!).
There are currently billions of social media platform users, and these sites are tailoring their platforms to be more social commerce friendly as possible. You can promote and sell your products on Facebook, Instagram, and even Pinterest. To learn more about this opportunity, here are the benefits of social commerce to your business.
Social commerce shortens the online shopping experience
Shopping on social media platforms streamlines the online shopping experience. Shopping on social media enhances a user’s experience by removing friction. Frictionless checkouts make for faster transactions because it will only take not more than three or four clicks to buy an item.
Facebook and Pinterest built their shopping platforms on their sites and apps for easy shopping. Facebook added Facebook Shops as an update to Facebook Marketplace and Shop Pages. Shops allow businesses to catalog their products in collections, allowing their customers to browse, save, share, and directly buy items within the app.
Even established companies with social media services would recommend selling your products on social media. Doing so has so much potential in attracting more attention to your brand. Recent studies show that 74% of consumers rely on social media to make purchasing decisions, which is a statistic that more businesses should capitalize on.
Social commerce provides a social online shopping experience
Social media platforms are a more interactive space for consumers to shop online. Since plenty of users consult social media for purchasing decisions, shopping on one makes that easier. Users can communicate with their network to hear their feedback on a product or recommendations on which one to buy.
You can still inform your friends about a planned purchase via the social media app. You can still take them with you while you shop digitally by sharing links to the items you’re interested in to get their opinions. If they know of a better recommendation, they can do the same and share links with you.
Social commerce drives more authentic engagement
Selling products on social media helps a lot in gaining organic engagement from your target potential customers. It boosts your brand’s reach, increasing its exposure and its chances of gathering comments and other user interactions. And with billions of users worldwide, it makes social media platforms a place of powerful branding opportunities.
Not only will you get likes, comments, and more followers, your brand can also interact with users. It gives your business the chance to get closer to consumers by connecting with them through interactions. Social media also serves as a communication channel that makes it possible to solve customer problems and address their concerns.
Business can make bank with social commerce
Earning a profit is always the end goal for businesses. Social commerce proves to be an excellent channel to sell products because of the money businesses can gain from it. Here are some relevant data that indicates it:
- 83% of Instagram users say that the platform helped them to discover new products and services.
- 46% of them made a purchase either online or offline after seeing a product on Instagram.
- 48% of Pinterest users go to the website specifically for shopping.
- Researchers forecast that e-sales will surpass $735 billion come 2023.
Social commerce will definitely help you sell your products and earn more money in the process.
Do you want to know how to sell on Instagram Shopping? Don’t miss this post where we explain how to do it.
Summary
These are the benefits of social commerce that your business can gain should you choose to get into it. You can streamline the online shopping experience, leverage social media’s influence on purchasing decisions, connect with patrons and new customers, and ultimately increase your profit. All of that sounds great, and you can make it possible with a solid strategy and implementation.
