Facebook is entering in new phase
of retail, as company is collaborating with more than 20 brands to facilitate
Instagram users to buy accessories, clothes and makeup on social network
without leaving the app.
“Checkout on Instagram” was a
previous shopping feature on the service, which bounds buyers to switch on
brand’s web page to process the transactions. Users had to enter payment and shipping
details, and often had to sign up for new users account, forcing many to change
their mind before completion of transaction.
Now, Facebook has introduced
in-app retail feature for its users. Users tap on a product they want to buy,
and select features of product like colors, design, size. After this they move
to a payment screen where they select mode of payment like credit cards and
finally provide shipping details which they had already provided to Instagram.
During launching stage, this
feature will be used by different brands including Nike, H&M, Kylie
Cosmetics, Uniqlo, but for the time being it is limited to US customers.
Instagram’s interest in
e-commerce opens a new window of revenue for the company and a new way to
encourage users to their payment information, providing assistance to Facebook
to launch other paid-for services. Checkout and Shopping features are not
available at adverts, rather it will appear in posts and newsfeed on Instagram
Stories, and will disappear after 24 hours.
The company assures that it will not
share users data with anyone including the brands that use this platform for
selling, except that required to make the purchase. But retailers intend to
keep contact with customers and this hurdle by Facebook will slow take-up of
the feature – as could the price to the seller.
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