According to some market research, social commerce is destined to hit 1.2 trillion dollars in 2025. Speaking of e-commerce trends, you have already come across this term for sure. But what is social commerce, exactly? And how can you make the most of it to grow your online business?

Social commerce is the practice of a business to sell its products from within a social media platform, by accompanying the customer from product discovery to checkout processes, without leaving the app.
Some social platforms (Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest, so far) have created real shops where you can upload products, pictures and product information. This is cutting the steps in the conversion processes, leading to a better customer experience, faster checkouts and growth in terms of customers and sales. Social media are being used by 4.5 billion people globally (more than half of the world population!), and this number is destined to grow. That is why this trend is becoming more and more popular among sellers, and it would be a pity not to take advantage of this new sales strategy.

Because social media is a tool available to more and more people, Hootsuite conducted a survey that gives us a clear idea of ​​how these platforms are becoming increasingly important in the sales strategies of a business:

Title: Top 3 outcomes organizations will try to achieve with social media in 2022
Source: Hootsuite Social Trends 2022 survey

We see from this survey that in 2022, many companies will decide to use social media as a tool to establish their brand and sell more.

Let's now analyze these outcomes and see some tips to make the most of them!

A powerful tool for increasing brand awareness

Selling on social media is not only a way to increase sales by using an additional channel but also a way to improve and establish brand awareness and trust.
Building brand awareness is key to a business's success. Being present and active on your clients' favourite social platform will give them a sense of trust and familiarity with your brand. It also allows promoting products on various platforms, increasing loyalty, and acquiring new followers or potential customers!

Note: brand awareness is influenced by consistency. That is, through sharing coherent images, product information, tone of voice, etc., regardless of the sales channel.

Acquisition of new customers

As stated above, social media is a very effective tool for increasing new customers' acquisition and driving conversions.

The great novelty of social media is that of being able to connect with a large number of people at any time and wherever they are. Using such powerful communicative tools allows a business to expand its clients range through a wider audience and even in more parts of the world.

Drive conversions by knowing your customers’ needs

Another great news brought by social media is that you can obtain different types of data regarding your followers. Through surveys and questions to the audience and in-app analysis tools, it has become easy to collect end-user data and understand what customers want to see and what they like. Listening and responding to consumers demands is a must if you want to stand out and survive as a business. Let's not forget that, even when used as a platform to sell products, social media still remains an instrument to establish a 2-way dialogue. Meaning your followers are there because they expect to engage and to be entertained.

So, using social media to connect with prospects, engaging and building relationships (social selling) is an excellent practice to, again, improve brand awareness, increase and drive conversions!

Some extra tips: 

Do not overwhelm your followers

After analyzing some advantages of social commerce, it must be said that if it is not exploited adequately, it could lead to the risk of annoying or overwhelming potential customers. It is better to upload only some products from your catalogue to the social media shop, such as the top sellers, to see how they go over and possibly add more later.

Make the most of images and product info

For greater engagement, it is good to focus on entertaining followers and grab their attention by solving their "problems" or giving them good advice, like how to use a product or why they should buy it. This is where you need to make the most of images and content, the undisputed protagonists of social media. Catchy photos that show real-life situations and complete and detailed descriptions that render product usage examples are key to social commerce success!