Facebook Shopping: The Next Big eCommerce Move

Facebook Shopping: The Next Big eCommerce Move

Therefore, Facebook is fully capable of offering a full ecosystem for social media purchasing and streamlining the whole consumer journey. From searching for the product you want, to checking out and paying, without having to exit the platform you are using. 

Facebook has always been about connecting you to what you love. That means friends and family, but also products, brands and businesses. For years, people have used Facebook apps to buy and sell things. From the early days of posting a photo of a bicycle with the caption “for sale,” to selling your coffee table on Marketplace, and now shopping styles from your favorite brands and influencers on Instagram. 

Facebook Shops is a mobile-first shopping experience. Here, businesses can easily create an online store across Facebook and Instagram for free. Shops let you choose which of your items you want to feature, merchandise with product collections, and tell your brand story with customisable fonts and colours. In Facebook Shops, you’ll be able to connect with customers from a product view all the way to checkout, using platforms such as WhatsApp/ Facebook Messenger or your native website where users will input payment methods and delivery details.

Reasons to use Facebook shops:

• Zero subscription fees
• Fast and secure platform (Checkout – In testing) read more here.
• Simple inventory management

1. The interface a user will be directed to once they’ve clicked “view shop”. This will feature banners with respective categories highlighted whilst featuring all products. This is all up to how you’d like to customise your store, and the look is fully customisable for Instagram and Facebook alike.
2. The user will be redirected to the collection interface once they’ve clicked on a featured banner. This mimics a website category and shares some of its features. Here you can list a collection, best sellers, new arrivals or split by price threshold.
3. Following this, a user will be taken to the PDP (product display page), which is the equivalent of a website product display page.
4. From the call to action found on the product display page, a user is taken to the deep link product for checkout and the payment transaction as Facebook and Instagram does not offer checkout on its platform as yet. Watch this space!

You are able to efficiently store and manage the products you’re trying to sell on Facebook, through a commerce manager.

Requirements needed to set up a commerce manager:

• Be the admin of a Facebook business manager and connect your Instagram and Facebook profile. This page needs to be owned by the aforementioned business manager.
• Generate a real-time product feed via your website that provides data about your in-stock and visible products that can be sold. This option is best however it’s not the only one.
• Ensure your domain is claimed via Facebook Business manager.
• Tip to prevent product disapproval: Make sure to exclude any products that go against facebook guidelines. Read more here

How to set up a Facebook/ Instagram shop:

Facebook Commerce surfaces include, but are not limited to: Facebook ads, Product tagging, Facebook shop, Instagram shop, Marketplace shop and Live shopping.

1. Go to Commerce Manager, and select create shops
2. Navigate through the 4 step process, we recommend setting up a catalogue first. It streamlines this process
3. In these 4 steps you will select your checkout method and sales channel
4. Once previewed and created, you’re ready to customise your store
5. To do this, go to the commerce manager and your newly created store, note: with a new store, it can take anywhere between 24-48 hours to be approved.
6. Once you’ve selected your store, head over to the “shops” tab and begin building your store by selecting the sales channel on your right and hit the edit button. When you’re happy with your updates, proceed to publishing updates.
7. Once published. Do not be alarmed if it doesn’t reflect immediately on your respective platforms as Facebook reviews this too.

Analytics

This section is found under insights within the commerce manager and has the following views and data availability:

Performance

This dashboard provides insight on the behaviour and traffic brought to your Instagram or Facebook shop and includes the following metrics:

Discovery

This provides insights into your locations by session. These locations are defined by the below:

Tagged content

Tagged content is media that you’ve tagged with products. Under this dashboard you will see the actions taken by visitors after they’ve viewed an Instagram post such as product page views, PDP clicks to your website and customers who have added a specific product to their wishlist.

Catalogue – This is the same as the above, however, does not only limit what was engaged with but all products found in your catalogue or collection.

Audience – The demographics and geographic overview of your visitors.

Written by Rayhaan Williams, Head of Digital Marketing.