What is social commerce? The advantages of social commerce
Social commerce is a concept we have encountered recently and now use frequently. Having come into widespread use with the growth of social media, this concept is referred to as s-commerce. In particular, as social media has become a phenomenon today and smartphones and tablets have turned into a permanent part of our lives, the concept has begun to make itself felt in recent years. In this article, therefore, we will examine the concept of social commerce and talk about its advantages.
Where social media and digital commerce intersect.
The concept of social commerce, or s-commerce, was first used by Yahoo in 2005. However, the real foundations of this concept were laid in 2008 and it began to spread after 2010. Pointing to the intersection of digital commerce and social media channels, this concept is not regarded simply as shopping. Social commerce is defined more as “marketing activity carried out by reaching out to users”. Naturally, social commerce carried out through today's most popular social networks — platforms such as Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and Pinterest — is also integrated with the e-commerce market.
The link between social commerce and e-commerce.
Today users are shifting more and more towards online shopping. Beyond that, brands are also prompting consumers to act through social networks. This gives an important clue about the relationship between e-commerce and social commerce.
According to research, more than 80% of users read comments on social media platforms and check what has been written about a product or service before buying it online. For this reason, social commerce is an essential concept for e-commerce sites and companies. In addition, with the rise of mobile usage consumers use social media platforms more actively. That is why businesses today are combining their e-commerce infrastructure with social commerce channels, trying to direct users to their sites through social media and raise their conversion levels.
What are the advantages of social commerce?
Although social commerce looks today like an extension of e-commerce, it is in fact a single system with its own advantages. This commerce system operates within the algorithms of social media. Therefore, the higher the traffic, the greater the advantage those accounts will enjoy. This in turn leads to a reduction in traditional marketing costs. In addition, within a social-media-oriented commerce system you can communicate directly with users and better analyse the points you are missing in line with user feedback.
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