We recently shared the exciting news that much to social media users and marketers’ delights, social media has finally 
delivered on the demand to be able to shop directly from their platforms. Pinterest and Instagram dived right into social shopping and now Twitter and Snapchat have joined the ranks with new features and opportunities.
Twitter Product Pages and Curated Collections
Twitter first offered marketers shopping opportunities with its Buy Now button but they have now expanded on the idea making it easier for marketers to get their products in front of target audiences. The first is product pages which are much richer than single tweets. They forego the short shelf-lives on single tweets which may be overlooked or quickly forgotten in the quick stream of scrolling in the platform. The product pages also defy character limits by opening up the possibility to display several tweets about a product on the same page as well as additional information. Of course products may also be directly purchased from product pages on Twitter.
Twitter’s curated collections are also making marketers’ experiences of working with the social platform much more worthwhile. The collections are offered by public figures such as celebrities or brands who offer their top products for a category (i.e. TechCrunch curated “5 smart kitchen gadgets”). The items named in the collections are each linked to their Twitter product pages for quick and convenient purchases. Twitter has been quick to mention that these offerings are only the beginning and that more possibilities will soon be delivered to users and marketers.
Snapchat Collaborates with ShopStyle for a Weeklong Shopping Opportunity
Not to be left out of the new wave of social shopping, Snapchat has joined the ranks with a weeklong exclusive shopping opportunity in collaboration with the fashion e-commerce brand, ShopStyle. Top influential fashion bloggers have selected the fashion items they want to feature in their Snapchat stories which followers can then go ahead and purchase directly from the Official Snap Hub.
Although the collaboration is only a weeklong experience, it is clear that it can also be considered a market test for more of such opportunities in the future or even more permanent shopping possibilities via Snapchat based on the responses of shoppers and feedback on this experience.
It will be interesting to see what selling possibilities will be next as well as to see which social selling methods will be the most desirable to which groups of target audiences.
