Last week, Twitter released its “Buy” option in Beta to a limited number of users. Also, a few dozen merchants are linked to the option but Twitter has announced plans to add hundreds more. This news come on the heels of Facebook’s foray into the direct eCommerce biz back in July.
It is the first time the social media site will infuse an eCommerce aspect to its platform enabling consumers to make direct purchases instantly from a tweet. Twitter states it will hold the customers’ credit card information securely and would not release it to sellers.
After a few taps and the purchase is completed, the seller ships the product.
Burberry, The Home Depot, Pharell, Keith Urban, and non-profit groups GLAAD and The Nature Conservancy are among the list of first merchants offering the buy option.
Some skeptics think the move will be regrettable and will taint the social media experience. Others say it will induce buyers’ remorse among users who too quickly make a purchase using the button and may regret it later.
Facebook’s Buy button was introduced in Beta in July
We are more practical and recognize this new feature as a monetization mechanism that will work and be more than a flash promotional experiment.
Already, affiliate marketers, website owners and merchants include direct links to purchase from tweets. They are using Twitter’s free platform to drive sales to their sites. It’s high time Twitter reaped the benefits of these sales as well.
Merchants and others who sell products and services may actually appreciate the opportunity to make it possible for consumers to make purchases by eliminating one step, and going straight to purchase, versus having to first navigate to a third party site and disrupt their Twitter feed browsing experience.
Buyers would always have the option of returning a purchase they are unsatisfied with, and exercising other customer service options to reach merchants over purchases, so the concern over Group-on-like buyers’ remorse is negligible.
It’s a win-win as customers who follow business accounts and welcome the idea of direct purchases.
A Twitter commissioned study last year revealed that 72 percent of a small business’ followers would likely make direct purchases from those businesses.
“This is an early step in our building functionality into Twitter to make shopping from mobile devices convenient and easy, hopefully even fun,” Twitter Group Product Manager Tarun Jain wrote in a blog post announcing the option. ” Users will get access to offers and merchandise they can’t get anywhere else and can act on them right in the Twitter apps for Android and iOS; sellers will gain a new way to turn the direct relationship they build with their followers into sales.”.
It could be a winning move for the social site which last year revealed that it was struggling on monetizing its massive user database beyond just through ads.
Here is a video from Twitter on how its “Buy” function will work:
