Social e-commerce a gold mine behind a like?
Social e-commerce is becoming one of the most widely used means of online sales by those who want to increase customers. But what is e-commerce? What are its advantages?
You'll get all the answers in this article! Appvizer explains what it is, its benefits, and what are the best platforms for doing social e-commerce.
What is social e-commerce?
Social e-commerce is nothing more than a recent evolution of e-commerce, which consists of selling products or services on social networks.
This form of online commerce involves social media and all other digital media, and is used by sellers but also by businesses.
This term was defined by Yahoo in November 2005 to name sales made on social networks.
In this type of e-commerce, consumers who have previously purchased a product write a comment to give their opinion.
In recent years, social e-commerce plays a very important role for both users and brands, because while users are able to take advantage of comments left by people who have previously purchased the product, brands are able to increase their sales.
What are the advantages of social e-commerce?
Social e-commerce has numerous advantages among them we will point out the most important ones:
- E-commerce is not only limited to promoting a product as in e-commerce platforms, but also deals with customer loyalty and improving the product through the comments left by customers who have previously purchased the product.
- Provide customers with a lot of importance as you give them the word by engaging them on social networks. This way you can analyze your customers' behavior, their preferences, and identify elements that should be improved on your product.This way you can connect with your customers and adjust your marketing strategy.
- Through the use of images, videos and collaborations with influencers, you can increase your notoriety and target your marketing strategy.
- Sharing posts on the side of users can increase brand credibility and your positioning against your competitors.
- Users will be able to make purchases quickly, this could be an advantage, as the speed of purchase can push a user to make a purchase.
- Choosing beautiful and attractive images can push a user to purchase.
- Everyone has at least one social network so selling on social could open new doors and lead you to new customers.
- Increased sales on smartphones: Social commerce was also created in response to the growing use of social platforms on smartphones. People use their phones by the thousand.
- If you choose influencers who have followers from the same target audience as you, you can increase your sales.
- If you have a high number of shares, likes and positive comments you can gain a lot of customers and grow your "brand awareness."
Social e-commerce and shoptainment
Shoptainment is a word composed of shopping and entertainment. The latter originated from the phenomenon of experiential selling. Shoptainment is a way of retailing by engaging customers and offering them interactive activities.
The main goal is to attract customers by differentiating and offering a different sales approach.This sales technique is highly developed in China, but it is also beginning to develop in Europe and America. One example is Alibaba, which allows its premium customers to attend dynamic and entertaining Live to see the latest news.
What is the difference between social e-commerce and social shopping?
We have a tendency to think that social e-commerce and social shopping are the same thing. Actually, social shopping is the set of all digital environments where users have the opportunity to share their purchases. Social e-commerce, on the other hand, is one form of e-commerce.
What are the best social platforms to increase your e-commerce sales?
The best social networks for selling directly to your customers are:
Facebook not only uses classic pages or Messenger by carrying out targeted advertising, but also uses Facebook Marketplace which is mostly used for selling used items among users and Facebook Shops which helps retailers connect and do business.
One of the advantages of Instagram is the fact that it allows you to create photo galleries, videos and save stories.Also thanks to Reels that last 15 minutes you can reach a larger audience.
If you have a business account that is linked to Facebook you can easily create a Shopping Post, thanks to the synchronization of the two platforms.
YouTube
Opening a YouTube channel could be a good idea to create a branded channel to enhance your e-commerce business and you can present your latest news about your catalog.In this c anal you could present the latest news about your catalog or collaborate with influencers and publicize your product, also showing in case you need to how to use it.
Snapchat
Snapchat is one of the most widely used social media and from a social point of view thanks to collaborations with influencers who can share your products you can increase your turnover and notoriety.
Like Instagram, Pinterest is also a social network that has images as its strong point. A Pinterest account allows you to create images and allow other users to share.In recent years, Pinterest has started social e-commerce: users simply find a pin of an item and tap on it to access the e-commerce that sells it.
TikTok
TikTok is not yet widely used for social e-commerce, but mostly for making short videos. However, the platform is working on new features to enable this social network to be useful for social e-commerce and allow influencers to redirect users to the e-commerce site.
Social ecommerce is a popular mode of selling and could definitely allow you to increase your revenue and raise awareness of your brand. Watch out for competitors! Work on your image to make yourself more known!
Article translated from Italian