If you’re a consumer brand and you don’t know what social commerce is then you better keep reading!
Social commerce is where ecommerce or online sales meet social media. The trend really took off during the COVID-19 pandemic when people were shopping through their phones and while they were scrolling their feeds. Now, social commerce has taken hold as a trend that is here to stay, with retail social commerce sales expected to reach $79.64 billion by 2025. Facebook is one of the top platforms for social commerce campaigns, but Instagram and TikTok are becoming more popular platforms for social sales.
Social commerce will continue to be around for a while mainly because it is powered by megatrends that are going on at the moment, like new technological applications (virtual reality, augmented reality, and the metaverse), greater smartphone penetration, and millennial and Gen Y/Z preference for online purchases. Social commerce is a great option for smaller brands that want to directly reach a larger consumer base, as well as large brands that want to be able to create unique content to market their product.
So what do brands need to know in order to master the social commerce trend?
First, it’s critical to identify the right platform for your brand’s target audience. Instagram might be the best choice for the millennial crowds, while TikTok is the preferred platform of Gen Y/Z. Brands should work with the content creation tools and features that their chosen platform offers in order to create a really successful social commerce campaign.
Second, influencer marketing has a lot to do with social commerce. You’ll want to make sure that you’re advertising your product in ads, but also working with influencer marketing to ensure that you get the maximum coverage on social media channels. That’s because “word of mouth” marketing is what social networks are all about, and what users expect to see from brands.
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Creating a seamless customer experience is essential for social commerce to succeed. That means that you need to get someone to answer all of the comments, DMs, and make the purchasing process as intuitive and straightforward as possible.
Make sure to take social commerce seriously, but also know that you can use it to test out new products, brand concepts, designs, language, and more. Something you can try is to test out different images for your ads and campaigns to compare the conversion rates and from there, decide on which concept to invest in. This can help you save precious marketing budget and achieve a more successful campaign.
Finally, don’t forget that social commerce is “social”, meaning that you should try to interact with users and consumers as much as possible to realize the benefits of this type of ecommerce. It’s much more personalized, honest, and transparent than working through a website or affiliate. So make the most of it!