By: Praveen Kumar
Introduction
Selling products on social media used to require more steps and a bit more luck in the past. You would promote a link to your website and hope potential users would click on it, add a product to their shopping cart, enter their details, and proceed to payment.
In recent years, major players in social media have integrated commerce directly into their platforms, making the process of purchasing products they discover easier than ever, without leaving the platforms.
With the average internet user spending 147 minutes a day on social media, the question facing busy business owners is not whether selling products through social media is worth the effort, but rather where and how should you invest your precious time.
The difference between social selling and social commerce
Like any other channel, social selling involves two distinct steps: building interest in your products and brand and engaging with potential customers (also known as “social selling”). Removing as much friction as possible from the checkout process itself to convert this interest and engagement into sales (known as social commerce).
Both steps are equally important, but they require different approaches. Let’s take a look at them. What is social selling?
What is social selling?
Social selling is the use of social media to sell indirectly by focusing on the social networking aspect and building genuine relationships with potential customers or the people influencing them.
This is what social selling can look like in action:
- Monitoring relevant conversations and responding to comments from potential customers
- Running post notifications for influencers so you can engage with them and their audience
- Posting social media content that showcases your expertise, appeal, and values to attract ideal customers
- Sending direct messages to introduce yourself to potential buyers, leading the conversation with value rather than commercial advertising
Platforms like LinkedIn, Reddit, Twitter, and Facebook Groups, where discussions and communities thrive, are optimal ways for social selling, especially if your niche spends time there.
Social selling is particularly impactful for service-based businesses selling to other businesses, or in cases where the return on cultivating individual relationships makes the time investment in social networking worthwhile.
If you sell products directly to consumers, social selling might involve community management: a continuous effort to engage with potential customers on your profile and the accounts they follow.
For example, Blueland illustrates how to sell eco-friendly cleaning products on social media through educational content and ongoing community management. They regularly share their expertise on sustainable products on Instagram, prompting questions from their audience that the brand can respond to in comments to build a relationship with their followers.
What is social commerce?
Social commerce is the use of social media to sell directly by facilitating some (or all) parts of the online shopping process, from browsing products to making a purchase.
Social commerce connects people, products, and content together to provide a more social shopping experience through:
- Making product information available where engagement is highest – on content showcasing the product
- Allowing shoppers to browse comments and likes, not just ratings, to gauge people’s feelings toward the product and brand, and then purchase with a few clicks
- Empowering content creators to compile and showcase your products in their social media stores
- Making product links more shareable by embedding them in shoppable content
- Eliminating the gap between thinking and paying by saving shopping details like email, credit card, and shipping address
Enables
You get a fully integrated social commerce experience on Instagram for users to discover products, consider them, and purchase them without leaving the app.
Top 4 Social Media Platforms for Selling Products
When it comes to social selling, not all platforms are equally effective. Some social media sites are simply better for selling products because they have heavily invested in social commerce features, or they make it easier for you to attract your target audience.
The good news is that almost all popular social media platforms offer integration with Shopify, allowing you to connect your social media channels to your online store, sync your entire product catalog, and sell in multiple places at once.
Rankings may vary depending on your business type, but when looking at the number of daily active users, overall influence on product purchase decisions, and social commerce functionalities, the best social media platforms for selling products today are:
- TikTok
In this article, we will explore the social commerce features of each of these platforms designed to help you sell products directly.
Facebook: Selling Products on the Largest Social Network
Facebook is the largest social network in the world, boasting over 2.9 billion users. But that’s not just the longstanding social aspect Facebook offers; it was also one of the first social networks to take social commerce seriously, with features for selling via Facebook Pages, Messenger, Instagram, and WhatsApp.
Business owners can find a wealth of options at their disposal to provide a great shopping experience on Facebook. Create your social media store with Facebook Shop.
If you have a Facebook Page for your business, you can create a Shop section on Facebook where you can aggregate products and collections, display relevant information such as price, sizes, and available colors, and even add the ability to check out directly on Facebook if you are eligible.
Setting up your Facebook Shop – or installing the Facebook channel for Shopify – should be your top priority if you’re interested in selling on Facebook, as it unlocks or enhances many other social commerce features on Facebook.
The Canadian brand Peace Collective makes the essential parts of its Shopify store experience, such as catalogs, product details, and option selection, directly available to Facebook users through its Facebook Shop.
Turn Customer Service into Sales Using Messenger
Facebook also offers commerce features within its messaging platform (Messenger) to help you communicate with potential buyers. Like a retail store associate who roams the store to help customers make purchase decisions, it allows store owners to set up automated replies and tips to provide self-service solutions for frequently asked questions, like you see below when contacting Peace Collective via the message button on its Facebook page.
Business owners can recommend a product or send pre-written replies and discount codes with a few clicks. You can even create an order and request payment via Facebook Pay directly within the chat.
Switching between the inboxes of different social media channels can be time-consuming. Here, Shopify store owners benefit from Shopify Inbox, which allows you and your team quick access to products, discounts, and customer support scripts to convert inquiries into sales from Facebook and other channels – all within one app.
Tag Products in Your Facebook Content to Make It Shoppable
In the same way you might tag a friend in a post on your personal Facebook page, you can also tag products in posts on your business page through your Facebook Shop, allowing your audience to browse your collections while consuming your content.
If
If you were sharing content about your products or promoting a new launch, this could convert the demand generated through content into direct sales.
In the example below, Kate Mcleod uses the product tagging feature to add a shoppable collection to a Facebook Watch video where she announces that her body stones are now available at Sephora.
Sell your products on Facebook Marketplace
Although Facebook Marketplace is considered a place dedicated solely to selling used items between individuals, it can be a great place to promote your products, as users are already looking to buy. Try creating individual listings for your products to attract new customers, especially if you run a small local business or are just looking for creative ways to earn money on the side.
Facebook may recommend your store to relevant users looking for specific products you sell. You can also run Facebook ads alongside Marketplace listings to appear alongside organic listings.
Perhaps the first option that comes to mind for many is advertising on Facebook: paying to promote your products to Facebook users.
If you want to regularly showcase your products to your ideal customers, paid ads on Facebook are your best option.
And there is no shortage of ad placement options on Facebook.
You can promote your products in ads that may appear in:
- Facebook feed on desktop and mobile
- Between Facebook videos on Facebook Watch
- The right column in the inbox of Facebook Messenger
- Facebook Stories
- Messenger Stories
- Facebook videos in live streaming before, during, and after visual content
- Facebook Reels videos
- Relevant Facebook search results
- Sponsored messages in Messenger with people you are having an open conversation with
- Instant Articles on Facebook in the mobile app
- Facebook Marketplace pages and search results
For example, when searching for “keyboards,” the Facebook Marketplace app not only displays individual listings for used keyboards but also showcases Facebook stores from brands that may match the search as well.
Pay to reach new customers using Facebook ads
Perhaps the first option that comes to mind for many is advertising on Facebook: paying to promote your products to Facebook users.
If you want to regularly showcase your products to your ideal customers, paid ads on Facebook are your best option.
And there is no shortage of ad placement options on Facebook.
You can promote your products in ads that may appear in:
- Facebook feed on desktop and mobile
- Between Facebook videos on Facebook Watch
- The right column in the inbox of Facebook Messenger
- Facebook Stories
- Messenger Stories
- Facebook videos in live streaming before, during, and after visual content
- Facebook Reels videos
- Relevant Facebook search results
- Sponsored messages in Messenger with people you are having an open conversation with
- Instant Articles on Facebook in the mobile app
- Facebook Marketplace pages and search results
For example, when searching for “keyboards,” the Facebook Marketplace app not only displays individual listings for used keyboards but also showcases Facebook stores from brands that may match the search as well.
An example of a Facebook Marketplace ad for a NuPhy keyboard in the search results for “keyboard” on the Facebook mobile app.
Instagram: Leveraging the Most Influential Social Media App for Sales
Nearly half of the people surveyed on Instagram use the app weekly for online shopping. This is not surprising when you consider how the app has shifted towards content and collaborated with influencers to integrate shopping experiences within the content. Sell through your Instagram shop
Instagram is part of the Meta family of brands, alongside Facebook. When setting up your Facebook shop, you will likely notice an option to set up your Instagram shop as well. Facebook and Instagram can be set up through Meta’s Commerce Manager (or within minutes in your Shopify store).
One of the stock manufacturing companies regularly adds new luggage tag designs to its Instagram store so that the brand can engage with 50,000 active followers to share, save, or purchase content later.
Make content on Instagram shoppable using product tags
By adding an Instagram shop, you can tag products directly in your Instagram posts – whether they are individual images, videos, photo collections, stories, or reels – to make them shoppable.
What’s more, Instagram recently announced that other accounts will also be able to use your product tags.
This not only makes collaboration with influencers, creators, and affiliate partners easier but also means that current customers will be more likely to share content about your products and tag them directly.
Reach your customers with Instagram ads
Meta’s Ads Manager gives you the opportunity to purchase advertising space not only on Facebook but also on Instagram, including:
- Instagram feed on the mobile app
- Instagram Explore tab
- Instagram Shop tab (the homepage, not individual Instagram Shop pages)
- Instagram Stories listings
- Between Instagram videos in live broadcasts
- Instagram Stories tab
The benefits of advertising on Instagram are that it can be an effective way to increase your follower count.
For example, Magic Spoon uses organically filmed video ads for Instagram Stories to promote its healthy and delicious protein-rich breakfast cereals. You can see them here in the Facebook Ads Library.
TikTok: Creativity to Sell on the Vertical Video App
The short video app TikTok has risen in popularity and is expected to become the third largest social network, thanks to its easy-to-use video creation tools and its unique mix of authenticity, education, and fun.
TikTok has also leaned into social commerce by partnering with Shopify, with features you can leverage to sell your products. Access a range of selling features with TikTok Shopping.
Like Facebook and Instagram, TikTok Shopping allows you to sell products from your catalog directly on your profile and through your TikTok content. On some TikTok profiles, you may notice a shopping icon – tapping on it reveals any products tagged in the content.
For commercial brands like Gymshark, which has spent the past few years growing a large TikTok audience with brand-related content, TikTok Shopping has transformed what was once a channel for brand awareness into a sales channel. Their followers can now discover products in the shop section on their profile or within individual content. Customers can also easily purchase products thanks to TikTok’s eCommerce features, such as product links that take followers directly to the product page.
Engage with your audience using live shopping on TikTok
Like the cooler televised shopping experiences, live shopping allows you to leverage TikTok’s live streaming feature – known as TikTok Live – to connect directly with the audience in real time, integrating products into the viewing experience for them to buy instantly.
Viewers can easily navigate between content and a collection of products with just a simple swipe, making it a great way to showcase a variety of products in a single piece of content.
You can see in the example below how a single live event can draw hundreds of engaged viewers at once while promoting multiple products. Since you can collaborate with other creators for co-hosting the live stream, adding social commerce effectively creates a whole new type of influencer marketing partnership on the platform.
Pinterest:
Discover and Organize Your Products
Pinterest has been a best friend to many shoppers, as people use the platform to plan and organize everything from purchases for big events, home decor updates, gifts, recipes, and more.
But Pinterest is not just known as a place to organize products. Users also have significant purchasing power, with 45% of households in the United States earning over $100,000 using the platform. This makes Pinterest a natural choice for discovering and organizing products, and the platform offers a range of features you can leverage to facilitate product sales.
Add a Shop Tab to Your Pinterest Profile
By enabling shopping on Pinterest, you can display a Shop tab similar to Instagram and Facebook. What’s noteworthy about Pinterest is its trusted affiliate merchant program, where approved sellers not only receive a badge on their profile to help secure trust, but may also gain additional visibility in Pinterest’s organic search results.
The Korean beauty and Asian goods brand Sukoshi Mart has a well-organized shop on its Pinterest profile that allows its content and repins to generate awareness while its products generate sales on the platform – all organically.
Promote Your Products with Pinterest Ads
Pinterest is a great source for organic sales, but also offers paid advertising features you’d expect from social media platforms.
Here are two types of Pinterest ads related to products:
- Shopping ads that appear in the Pinterest feed and include specific product details such as price and availability
- Collection ads that appear in the Pinterest mobile app, and when clicked, expand to reveal a browsable collection of products within the app
Here you can see how a search for “coffee” on Pinterest showcases not only organic Pinterest pins related to coffee, but also an ad for iced mocha coffee – a perfect time for Pinterest users interested in caffeine-filled cold drinks for the summer.
Sell Your Products on Social Media – Where Your Customers Already Are
Convenience has always been at the heart of innovation in e-commerce – and social commerce is a trend that shows no signs of slowing down. Building a presence on social media – where your customers are already spending their time – makes more sense than ever.
As social media platforms increasingly embrace social commerce over time, social media marketing will shift from a channel focused on brand awareness and engagement to one that can become a valuable source of repeat sales for commercial brands.
So, which platforms will you build your business on?
Frequently Asked Questions about Selling Products on Social Media
How to Sell Products on Social Media?
There are several steps you can take to sell products on social media:
- Identify your target audience: Research your target audience and find out where you can locate them online.
- Choose the right platform: Social media platforms vary in terms of the types of products and services that can be sold on them.
- Create engaging content: Content is king! Develop exciting, relevant, and engaging content.
Source: https://www.shopify.com/blog/sell-products-social-media
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