From downtown storefronts to social media feed pages, shopping remains a universal experience. Ranging across merchandise sectors, from fashion to food and beverage, the increasingly close alliance between social platforms and e-commerce has given rise to a new way of shopping, ushering in an era dedicated to social commerce.
The term "social commerce" refers to the ability to buy with a simple click, directly from your favorite social platform, without having to search for the product on the brand's website and prompting an increasingly emotional purchase.
Social Commerce is a growing trend. According to Statista by 2030, its global value will exceed $8.5 trillion.
Let's see together how this phenomenon is structured and how businesses can integrate it within their online strategy.
Social commerce, what is it?
Social Commerce is an innovative sales model that leverages social media platforms to facilitate the purchase of products and services. It is an evolution of online commerce that offers a more engaging, immediate and interactive shopping experience for consumers.
The phenomenon is not to be confused with simple e-commerce or social shopping, which instead aims through personalized offers to land the user on a landing page within their own site.
Social Commerce presents itself as a natural evolution of online shopping for the new generation and has as its main feature non-interruption of the Customer Journey within social.
The success of this marketing trend is in fact based on one of the cornerstones of the effective sales world, simplicity: fluidity of the buying process is the key to increasing the conversion rate.
Imagine a smooth, easy and convenient online shopping experience. In just a few clicks, users can shop without having to create accounts, type in passwords or remember payment details because all the information has already been recorded beforehand.
This model can be put into practice through various ways, thanks to the wide choice that platforms offer to reach users. We are talking about Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, but especially TikTok, a platform that is constantly growing in terms of the effectiveness of its formats.
The phenomena of social commerce
Each social platform offers, depending on its characteristics, different opportunities to reach consumers.
Shoppable post
The Shoppable posts are a first concrete example of social commerce. Brands publish through their profile posts with images containing the products to be promoted, which, thanks to a linked tag, can be purchased directly from the post with a simple click.
Live Shopping
If, on the other hand, we think of interactive content we find Live shopping,where brands hold live streaming shopping events, during which products can be purchased as soon as they are shown on the potential buyer's device. Customers can interact with the brand and other users, asking questions and getting instant information. This immersive mode aims to recreate a similar experience as offline, with the convenience of being able to buy through their smartphones, from anywhere.
Social media marketplace
One of the certainly most popular tools is that of social media marketplaces: some social platforms, have created dedicated spaces where brands can sell their products in dedicated spaces, such as Facebook marketplace and Instagram shopping. The advantage of these virtual platforms is that online businesses can leverage social media engagement to reach a wider audience.
Influencer marketing
The role of influencers has taken hold and grown exponentially in recent years, with companies choosing to entrust the launch and presentation of their products to people who reflect their values and have a large following on social media. With influencer marketing, the people chosen can review products, create promotional content or simply share their experience with their followers by putting the direct link to be able to buy the sponsored product, with exclusive discount codes to incentivize purchase.
The benefits of social commerce
There are a multitude of benefits for companies that decide to incorporate social commerce within their strategy. Due to the versatility of this tool, it can be adopted by all types of businesses, starting with smaller and less structured ones.
The benefits of social commerce for brands include:
- Increasing Brand Awareness: the ability to shop smoothly and quickly can help brands increase their visibility and notoriety on social media.
- Better data collection and insights: Social media can provide brands with valuable data about their customers ,especially when integrated with a CRM such as HubSpot, which can be used to improve their marketing strategies.
- Strengthening customer engagement and journey:Social commerce can help brands create a closer relationship with their customers, increasing loyalty, and advocacy within the community and consequently also sales.
How to best integrate your social commerce strategy
As with any tool, integration occurs successfully only if it is incorporated into one's overall strategy in a coherent manner and with well-defined objectives to make the most of the potential of this innovative sales model.
In fact, not all social platforms are suitable for social commerce; one must know how to choose those that best suit the target audience and the type of product being sold.
Answering users' questions and giving immediate assistance improves the shopping experience, building trust and prompting consumers to return to our page.
A key role is played by choosing the right e-commerce. Adopting a structure that is flexible and easily integrated with social channels allows you to give your business a boost without the risk of running into blockages or closed platforms. Shopify and BigCommerce are the right ecommerce sites to bring a smooth social commerce strategy to life through integrations with major social channels.
power2Cloud is the right partner for your digital strategy
In an ever-changing digital world, companies of all industries and sizes must be able to adapt quickly to new technologies and audiences. Social Commerce represents a unique opportunity for brands that want to reach a wider audience, increase sales, and improve the customer experience.
power2Cloud is a BigCommerce and Shopify partner, it can help you activate and configure the tools that will allow you to best implement effective Social Commerce strategy, integrating a platform tailored to your needs with the support of an experienced team with hundreds of customers under their belt.
What are you waiting for? Contact us now to learn more!