Winning Moments in Social Commerce
Motom, currently mobile web beta, was launched in April 2021 with strong early adoption among creators and their audiences. Motom is a social shopping platform that gives creators the power to launch their own storefront in such a way that their content from TikTok, Instagram and YouTube can be made shoppable in one place. It […]
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Motom, currently mobile web beta, was launched in April 2021 with strong early adoption among creators and their audiences.
Motom is a social shopping platform that gives creators the power to launch their own storefront in such a way that their content from TikTok, Instagram and YouTube can be made shoppable in one place.
It allows its users to share their or their favourite creators’ TikTok videos to Motom and link the items being worn or used for direct purchase, making them instantly shoppable by their followers, fans, and friends. It also allows people to launch a centralised storefront on the Motom platform so that all social posts from Instagram, TikTok and YouTube can be shared and shopped in minutes.
Matt Diamond, CEO of Motom, said, “By making all social content instantly shoppable with users’ existing social content from TikTok, Instagram and YouTube, and giving them access to thousands of brands and retailers, Motom provides a valuable new source of income for all creators, regardless of the size of their following.”
That’s social commerce- brands selling directly on social media platforms. It’s not Facebook advertisements to drive traffic to websites, where people complete the purchase. In social commerce, the purchase happens directly on social media platforms, usually within the app.
According to Grand View Research, the global market share for social commerce was worth about $475 billion in 2020, and it is predicted to reach $3.4 trillion over the next seven years.
The use of social media is at its peak among teens and young adults — 28 per cent of the population across the Middle East aged between 15 and 29, whereas the median age range is 22, and globally, the median age is 28.
In the MENA region, eCommerce sales spiked 52 per cent in just a year from 2019 to 2020, as per Wamda. Whereas, there was a remarkable spike in demand and adoption during the pandemic. 80 per cent of young Arabs shop online frequently as compared to 71 per cent in 2019. Moreover, 50 per cent of those aged 18-24 are shopping online more, even after the pandemic restrictions have eased.
Without a doubt, social commerce is leading the future of eCommerce. From Facebook to Twitter, social commerce advertisements are growing.
Having said that, social platforms have to modify their technology to meet the high demands of consumers and make their experience as effortless as possible. Here are the latest features that brands can leverage to engage fans and complete the purchase.
Also Read: Modernising CX: A Last Mile Delivery Story
Facebook and Instagram
Facebook has always been ahead when it comes to retail advertising. It began with building a shopping catalogue and feeding it into dynamic remarketing advertisements and then developing collection ads.
As a matter of fact, Facebook brings about 85 per cent of all social media orders. Besides, it is no surprise that this platform is attempting to make a purchase even simpler.
Still, the social media giant has taken a step further and has announced a variety of new shopping and discovery tools, including Shops on WhatsApp, Shop listings in Facebook Marketplace, and new visual product search option on Instagram, which looks very familiar. The platforms created that serve the purpose are Facebook Shop and Instagram Shop for consumers to browse and make purchases — while Instagram Shop was launched recently, Facebook Shop is still being tested. Customers will be attracted to shop on these platforms because of personalised recommendations, feature collections of products, and a directory of merchants selling on the platform — they get several shopping tools in one location.
It provides more ways to connect with businesses and buy from retailers through livestream shopping and messages. These tools offer new ways for consumers to interface with sellers, potentially making Facebook an attractive shopping destination.
For instance, the global brand ‘New Balance’ used Facebook social commerce possibilities to make their products easily available to their audience.
It allows shoppers to start shopping instantly from the Facebook store section.
Their Facebook store helps the audience to get insights into the products, gather all the relevant product information and proceed to buy the products through checkout CTAs.
TikTok
TikTok has introduced shopping-based formats and features this year. Dynamic product advertisements are added, which allow users to be automatically retargeted with products according to their activities and interests within the app and websites linked to it.
Also Read: Is Social Commerce The Future of Shopping?
Owned by Facebook, Whatsapp has around two billion users and 175 million users use Whatsapp Business accounts for customer support. It’s no surprise that Whatsapp also introduced a shopping feature, which gives consumers the opportunity to communicate with a business making a purchase. Recently, WhatsApp announced that it added a new feature called WhatsApp Payment.
“This secure payment experience makes transferring money just as easy as sending a message. People can safely send money to a family member or share the cost of goods from a distance without having to exchange cash in person or going to a local bank,” said WhatsApp.
This update is proving big with brands and consumers since many online shops have turned instant messaging services into their primary method to interact with their consumers.
This year, even Pinterest came up with dynamic products ads. These can be formulated through product feed or by uploading multiple assets, and then displayed to users based on their behaviour. For instance, if users search for printed sofa covers, they’ll get the closest results to the product set.
Conclusion
Social Commerce is the future, and both brick-and-mortar retailers and eCommerce are adopting it to drive sales. Social media and social commerce go hand in hand and as and when social media grows, so will social commerce.
