Michelle Krasniak - Social Media Marketing All-in-One For Dummies

If money makes the world go ’round, e-commerce takes the cybersocial world for a dizzying spin. Many options exist for promoting or linking to your online store from blogs and social networks, but several applications now let you sell directly (or indirectly) from social media pages.

Always check the terms of service on social media sites to be sure you aren’t violating their rules. Some services may prohibit selling directly from their site. Check out the possibilities on Facebook Marketplace, Etsy, Pinterest, or Instagram Shopping.

The easiest way to sell from social networks and blogs is simply to post a banner or a text link to your own website or to other sites that sell your products (Etsy, for example). Additionally, you can post images on a site such as Facebook with links to your website or other sites.

Marleylilly is an online boutique that accomplishes this in a sophisticated manner, as shown in Figure 1-2. For example, clicking a featured item on its Facebook timeline ( www.facebook.com/marleylilly/?fref=ts ) takes shoppers to Marleylilly’s website at https://marleylilly.com/product/monogrammed-layering-tunic to fill their carts and check out.

If you’re looking for a more seamless experience, consider e-commerce tools that display items from your existing online store on your blog or social media pages, and then either link automatically back to your web store to complete the transaction or permit users to purchase directly from the social media page.

E-commerce badges are mini-displays of products; these changeable badges (which appear onscreen as a large button with multiple links) link to an existing web store. If you already have an online store, check your shopping cart or check stand provider (the section of your online store that totals orders and takes payments) to see whether it offers a badge for social media, like the one shown in Figure 1-3.

Many vendors of online stores offer apps with shopping or promotional functionality for use on specific social media services. For example, 2020AVE uses the Shop Now function to sell on Facebook ( www.facebook.com/2020ave ).

As we all know, every extra click can cost sales. That’s why many businesses choose to sell directly from a social media channel in addition to or instead of linking people to their website, Etsy store, or Amazon store.

Courtesy of Marleylilly

FIGURE 1-2:Product offerings can begin on Facebook (top) and then link to a separate shopping website (bottom).

Courtesy of the owner of The Little Dabbler

FIGURE 1-3:The Etsy mini-badge on the right side of this blog drives traffic to the Etsy shop for The Little Dabbler.

This solution can be a very cost-effective one for some B2C micro-businesses with only a few products, at least until they grow large enough to make a dedicated storefront worth the investment. Selling through a social channel may also make sense for introducing new or trending products or generating interest that would drive prospects to a fully empowered storefront.

Marketers for large companies and those with a B2B audience are a bit cautious. Social media channels are not yet flexible enough to handle large inventories or the long-sales cycle generally needed to complete a high-ticket B2B purchase.

Another potential downside to selling only from social media is that you can’t always land paid search ads on a social media channel. Some PPC platforms, including Google, require that a landing page include the actual URL for the company. If you plan to advertise only on the social media platform from which you are selling (such as Facebook), this is not a problem.

Multiple apps allow shoppers to either complete a purchase directly from your Facebook page or be directed to another website to finish buying. Go to www.facebook.com/business/help/912190892201033 for more information.

Pinterest requires merchants to have a business account to sell on its platform. (See Book 7, Chapter 1to learn how to set up a Pinterest business account.) Once you sign up for a business account and claim your website, you get access to Rich Pins. Rich Pins grab current products from an existing online store and place a link back to that product on each Pin you add to Pinterest. These Rich Pins are set apart from search results into a separate category called Shop. When you click a Rich Pin under the Shop category, you’re taken to that Pin, which contains a link back to that specific product on the vendor’s website (see Figure 1-4).

Courtesy of Blue Nile

FIGURE 1-4:The Buy section of the search results page (top). Click on a specific result to see the Pin with a link back to the product page on the vendor’s website (bottom).

You have to have a business account in order to use Instagram Shopping. (See Book 7, Chapter 3to learn more.) After you have a business account and set up Instagram Shopping in the Settings section, you’ll be able to customize a storefront to sell your products and tag your products in posts and stories, so users can tap on the tags to shop the products and gain access to important data insights about your shop.

You’ll need a company Facebook page in order to connect a product catalog to Instagram. In other words, you need a product source.

The product sources supported are

Facebook Catalog Manager

Shopify

BigCommerce

Magento

WooCommerce

Facebook Shop

Once you select the catalog you want to connect, just follow the specific instructions provided for that platform.

For more information about the pros and cons of selling through social media, try these sites: https://flutterwave.com/sd/blog/blog/selling-on-social-media-with-an-online-store-vs-selling-on-social-media-without-one-which-is-best-for-you or http://ecommerce-platforms.com/ecommerce-selling-advice/best-apps-tools-use-selling-social-media .

The following sections discuss some of the many third-party tools and products available for selling products through social media as an alternative to linking to a storefront on your website, or to selling directly using the sometimes limited solutions provided by the social media platform. Instead, most of these solutions link from social media to an independent storefront. Consider these items as examples of the range of products available. You should research and evaluate products to meet your own needs.