Facebook Shops announced for small businesses struggling from COVID-19, should Amazon and eBay be worried?

Nationwide lockdowns have been implemented due to the coronavirus outbreak. As a result, people are working from home and only shops selling essential items are open. While this move is crucial to contain the spread of the virus, it is impacting various small businesses that rely on people walking in and buying things from them directly. To help such businesses that are currently struggling, the social media giant Facebook is launching Facebook Shops. 

Facebook Shops to help struggling small businesses

Many small businesses are suffering due to lockdown and they need customers to stay afloat. However, with people working from home and maintaining social distancing, this is next to impossible right now. So, the next best thing for such companies is to start conducting business online. Facebook believes that its newly introduced Facebook Shops will help small businesses with this. The feature enables shops to list themselves online and connect easily with consumers. 

Creating Facebook Shops profile for your businesses

With Facebook Shops, businesses can make themselves available online for consumers on both Facebook and Instagram. Creating a listing on Facebook Shop is also free of cost and enables businesses to pick the products they want to feature from their catalogue and then customise the look and feel of their shop with a cover image and accent colours that best represent their brands. 

People will be able to find Facebook shop listings on a business’ Facebook Page or Instagram profile. In addition, these listings will also be discoverable via stories or ads. One will be able to browse the full collection, save interesting products and place an order as well. 

Facebook shops will also enable users to message businesses via WhatsApp, Messenger or Instagram Direct to ask questions, get support, track deliveries and more. Furthermore, Facebook will enable users to view a business’ shop and make purchases right within a chat in WhatsApp, Messenger or Instagram Direct in the future. Facebook Shops is being rolled out today and will be widely available in the coming months. 

Should Amazon and eBay be worried

Online e-commerce companies such as Amazon and eBay are currently providing businesses with a platform to connect with consumers. With Facebook Shops, they have a new contender in the same space. Facebook has a major advantage against the competition in terms of reach. Its audiences are distributed over the company’s different platforms such as Facebook and Instagram. 

Additionally, users intuitively browse Facebook and Instagram more than Amazon or eBay. Thus, Facebook could have a great impact on Amazon and eBay. However, nothing concrete can be said until Facebook Shop is actually up and running for all.

Main image credits: Facebook

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