What is social commerce?
Social commerce is buying and selling directly inside social media, without ever leaving the app. A shoppable post, a checkout inside a chat, a video you can buy from, that is social commerce turning scrolling into shopping.
Buying and selling directly inside social media, without ever leaving the app.
The customer buys right there, instead of hunting for the product on a website.
Community and content become part of the storefront, not a separate marketing channel.
Marketing drives people to a store; here the purchase happens inside the platform.
It collapses the gap between discovery and purchase. Instead of seeing a product on social, then hunting for it on a website, the customer buys right there in the moment they want it.
Figure 1. Where the purchase happens
Marketing drives people to a store; social commerce is the store, so the step of hunting for the product on a website disappears. Drawn from the definitions in this post; it shows structure, not data.
For brands it means meeting customers where they already spend their time, and treating community and content as part of the storefront rather than a separate marketing channel.
NeoSOFT built a multilingual social commerce platform for a Saudi marketplace, blending commerce and community at scale.
How is social commerce different from social media marketing?
Marketing drives people to a store. Social commerce is the store, with the actual purchase happening inside the social platform.
Social media marketing
Drives people to a store- The customer sees a product on social
- Then hunts for it on a website
- The purchase happens outside the social platform
Social commerce
Is the store- A shoppable post, a checkout inside a chat, a video you can buy from
- The customer buys right there, in the moment they want it
- The purchase happens inside the social platform
Related services: ecommerce solutions.
Related reading
Related terms: headless commerce, subscription commerce.
