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Facebook is experimenting with a feature that could help your business sell products.[/caption]
If you have a Facebook page for your business, more good news may be coming your way.
Facebook is experimenting with a new feature, a shop section, that will allow you to see products directly from your Facebook page. It is a new feature, currently being tested and so far it looks like those tests are fairly random. If you are in the group, setting up a shop section is a fairly easy process.
Here’s what you need to do.
First, find out if you have access. You’ll see the option under the bottom right corner of your cover photo, a highlighted link that says “+ Add Shop Section.” Click on that. You’ll see a brief description of what a shop section is, and then another “Add Section” button. Click on that, too.
As with anything else on the internet, you’ll have to agree to the terms and conditions. Make sure you read these over; don’t just skim the bullet points and click continue. They contain important information about what you can sell, return policies, when the section will launch, and how to troubleshoot complaints.
Then, you’ll have to set up your business and payment details. Facebook processes payments through Stripe, so you’ll need to set up an account there if you don’t have one already. If you already have a Stripe account, you can connect it to your Facebook shop section.
Once you do that, you’ll have to describe what your shop section will sell. You’ll have to be brief: you only have 200 characters, which is letters, numbers and spaces.
Then, you’ll be ready to add some products. A few things to remember, here: you’ll need a picture of each one and that image cannot be an illustration or other kind of graphic. Everything is subject to review before it goes live, and the reviewers want to see an actual picture of the product. (You can get imaging guidance from the Facebook help section). Also, remember your product descriptions should be short and concise.
Once you start adding products, you’ll have the ability to group them into collections for easier browsing and, hopefully, purchasing. An “Add a collection” button will appear once you start adding products. By clicking that, you’ll be able to group them together. Think about a Featured Products collection that will group popular items, sale items, seasonal items or whatever you’d like to showcase to your customers.
Once you get everything set up, you’ll have a new Manage Shop option under your page’s menu where you can swap out products and make other changes. You can also find a help section with frequently asked questions and basic tutorials.
What do you think? Would you use something like this? Tell us in the comments!