WhatsApp opens in-app shopping, joining Facebook’s e-commerce push for small businesses

Brief:

• WhatsApp will begin offering in-app purchases as millions of people rely on the Facebook-owned messaging app to communicate with businesses, according to a company blog post. The platform is at the same time making a concentrated push to offer cloud-hosting services.   
• WhatsApp will expand ways for app users to check out products for sale in Facebook Shops, the social network’s online storefronts, and buy items directly from a chat. WhatsApp also plans to make it easier for businesses to integrate in-app shopping with their existing commerce and customer solutions. The features will be available this year, WhatsApp COO Matt Idema said in an interview with Reuters.
• WhatsApp also plans to let businesses manage their messages through hosting services that Facebook plans to offer, while expanding its partnerships with third-party vendors of software and services. The development falls in line with Facebook’s push to establish a bigger e-commerce footprint, a strategy that’s accelerated under the coronavirus pandemic. 

Insight:

WhatsApp plans to offer more in-app shopping features and hosting services from Facebook to help smaller companies upgrade their mobile marketing and e-commerce efforts. With many consumers avoiding physical stores during the pandemic, those businesses need ways to stay in touch with customers through their smartphones, including services like buy online, pickup at curbside that limit personal contact.

“Many of the old ways in which people and businesses communicate are not working,” WhatsApp said in its blog. “The global pandemic has made clear that businesses need fast and efficient ways to service their customers and make sales.” 

The popularity of WhatsApp has made the app an important channel for small business marketers to connect with consumers. More than 175 million people a day send a message to an account on WhatsApp Business, the app’s service for enterprises, per data shared by the platform.

The new hosting services aim to help small- and medium-sized businesses start selling products, maintain inventory records and give employees the tools to quickly respond to messages from any location. WhatsApp plans to charge businesses for some of the services, per the blog post.

Read more: https://www.retaildive.com/