Facebook is known for many things: connecting people, friends and family, providing a platform for political activism and offering a place for small business owners to market themselves. In recent years, though, it’s also become a powerful engine for ecommerce, too.
In fact, Facebook is now an essential tool for stores who want to engage customers on a social and shopping level.
While Facebook itself works pretty well as an ecommerce platform, there are dozens of Facebook ecommerce apps that can further enhance the customizability and ease of use of the Facebook storefront.
Here’s what you need to know:
Why Use Facebook Ecommerce Plugins?
There are dozens of reasons to use Facebook ecommerce plugins. The largest, however, is that they can expand and improve Facebook’s existing functionalities.
Many of the plugins mentioned in this post also integrate with virtual storefronts such as Magento, 3dcart and Shopify, so you won’t have to spend a ton of time re-uploading your inventory or altering your products massively.
Social Commerce (By the Numbers)
Here’s a brief overview of the state of social commerce right now, and why your brand should be focusing on it:
- For 87% of customers, social media helps them make purchasing decisions and decide what to buy.
- 25% of consumers rely on social networks for inspiration and advice when they purchase clothing.
- 90% of people want to communicate with the brands they follow on social media.
- 50% of customers appreciate social media-based customer service and think it improves the customer service process.
- In 2017, social networks saw $41 billion in advertising revenue. Facebook was responsible for a whopping $10.14 billion of this.
- The average ecommerce shopper spends $1.8K on web-based purchases annually.
- The average customer spends about $65 per purchase on items through the Instagram app.
- About 71% of consumers have a more favorable impression of a brand after seeing positive social media reviews.
- Facebook boasts a 6.21% market share and a 0.77% conversion rate.
- 67% of Millennials would rather shop online than go to a physical store.
7 Facebook Ecommerce Plugins That Rock
Wondering which Facebook ecommerce plugins your store should consider using? Here are seven of our absolute favorites:
1. StoreYa.com
[/mk_fancy_title]
StoreYa is a favorite ecommerce plugin thanks to the fact that it works with Magento, which remains one of the most popular ecommerce platforms out there. The plugin also works with third-party sites like Etsy, Amazon, eBay and WordPress (through the WooCommerce plugin).
If you already have an online store setup with one or more of these providers, it’s easy to import it to StoreYa in just a few clicks.
That’s not the primary reason people love this plugin, though: the fact is that it offers some of the best ecommerce marketing tools out there. By using the service as a storefront provider, users can access shopping features ranging from coupon pop-ups to group buying functionalities that mimic Groupon. There’s also the possibility of “scratch and win” coupon games, and so much more.
The plugin offers one free plan, which allows people to access coupon pop-up features and more. Plans increase in price from there and depending on SKUs.
2. Storefront Social
[/mk_fancy_title]
Storefront Social is a Facebook ecommerce plugin that is perfect for new stores as well as brands that want to update their storefronts and online presence. Sharing some functions with StoreYa, Storefront Social integrates with more than 20 providers and offers connections to hosted shopping cart services, such as X-Cart, 2D Cart, and OSCommerce.
The prices for this plugin start at $9.95 per month, for up to 100 products, although there is a 7-day free trial option.
Storefront Social doesn’t have all the same marketing features as other Facebook ecommerce apps, but it does offer outstanding connection and capability options. Storefronts that use the app can enjoy a streamlined connection to social platforms like Pinterest, Twitter, and Google+, as well as integration with international languages and currencies.
Stores created with Storefront Social are also mobile-friendly, which is essential for anyone looking to participate in Facebook ecommerce.
3. Ecwid
[/mk_fancy_title]
Ecwid is one of the biggest and most popular Facebook e-commerce apps, thanks in large part to its outstanding free plan. Designed to allow business owners to add as many as ten products, this ecommerce plugin doesn’t require setup or per-transaction fees. It is, hands-down, one of the fastest ways to begin selling on Facebook; even if you’re just getting started in ecommerce and social commerce.
Plan tiers start at $12.50 per month, and run up to $82.50/month, depending on the number of products you’ve got to list.
The pricing tiers allow you to sell digital goods, including courses and eBooks. If you pay more for higher-priced plans, you’ll enjoy the ability to offer coupons and manage your Facebook storefront via the iPhone app. The product works together with existing merchant and content management systems, including WordPress and Joomla. Ecwid hosts its Facebook stores on Amazon S3, which is one of the most secure and streamlined digital storage networks out available.
4. Shopify’s Suite of Apps
[/mk_fancy_title]
Shopify offers a suite of apps that are not truly “Facebook plugins,” in the traditional sense but are well-known for their user-friendliness and integration abilities. When a customer hosts a storefront on Shopify, they’re able to choose from hundreds of store templates ranging from less than $30 per month and up to $179 per month.
Shopify also stands out by offering dozens of features that other providers don’t, including unlimited products on all plans, free card readers and discount codes at checkout. Pricier plans provide outstanding conversion optimization and have the potential to reduce shopping cart abandonment by retargeting and recovering these consumers, which is a unique option among modern ecommerce customers.
6. ShopTab
[/mk_fancy_title]
The BigCommerce Facebook shopping cart app makes your entire BigCommerce catalog available via your Facebook business page.
This allows customers to discover and share your products seamlessly and leads to more sales for your company. US merchants can even utilize Facebook checkout to allow for sales without ever leaving the platform. Pricing starts at about $29.95 per month, and each plan includes Facebook commerce capabilities.
5. BigCommerce Facebook Shopping Cart
[/mk_fancy_title]
ShopTab is used by heavy-hitters like Coca-Cola, Fiji Water and Sensa, to name a few. While tabs (the feature after which ShopTab is named) are a thing of the past in the world of Facebook ecommerce, ShopTab has stuck around and found a way to stay relevant via a user-friendly, easy-to-integrate solution that allows Facebook marketers the ability to customize their Facebook shop from start to finish.
Using this plugin, you can choose how many products you want to display on your homepage, require users to “Like” a page before browsing, and by extending shopping/purchasing abilities to more currencies and languages across the board.
Pricing starts at $10 per month, and runs up to $20 per month, depending on products, which can range from 500 all the way to 5,000. While more advanced plans offer greater customization and flexibility options, each pricing structure is powerful enough to skyrocket your Facebook store without much additional work
7. Vendevor
[/mk_fancy_title]
While the Vendevor plugin is smaller and lesser known than some of its counterparts, Vendevor remains a strong player in the Facebook ecommerce plugin game.
Thanks to their hosted application (which includes credit card processing capabilities), this plugin allows simple set-up and takes just a few minutes to develop an online store and integrate it with Facebook. Despite its functionality, Vendevor does have a few drawbacks. Namely, consumers can only add three variations per product, and you can’t enable coupon codes unless you have the pro plan (many other plugins offer this for free).
Vendevor is simple to set-up and easy to use, which makes it popular for people who are new to ecommerce.
Streamlined is the Name of the Game
If you’re looking for a way to streamline selling on social media, using any of these seven Facebook ecommerce apps is a great option. Built to simplify the checkout, shopping, and browsing process, these apps are a great way to enhance the online shopping experience for your customers, generate new sales, and improve customer loyalty and retention.
Need even more social commerce statistics for 2018? We’ve got you covered with this detailed infographic!