By Anurag Kedia

The post-Covid relationship between brands and consumers has changed significantly. Realising the need to develop a low-risk sanitary mode of shopping, businesses have begun to shift towards an online direct-to-customer (D2C) model. Since D2C brands began to focus on establishing an omnichannel presence, social and live commerce expanded, forming a unique fusion, to serve niche and customised products to new-age customers. While social commerce penetrated the industry and gave brands an opportunity to create a platform for their existing customers and attract attention from potential customers, live commerce also picked up the pace and helped consumers to watch and shop the products at the same time. Thereby, helping D2C brands boost customer engagement and sales.

With the evolution of the shopping experience, brands felt the need to evolve their medium of communication as well. A well-managed website and presence on e-commerce marketplaces are no more enough. The evolving nature of online shopping has now led to the emergence of social media marketplaces. Thus, transforming social media platforms from simply a medium of connecting users to a holistic platform enables end-to-end sales. In this article, let’s dive deep into the boom of social and live commerce and how beauty and personal care brands can leverage it to amplify their growth.

The boom in social and live commerce

Technological advancements have opened an array of possibilities for e-commerce brands. Social media apps like Facebook and Instagram have enabled sales through in-app purchase features and on the platform marketplaces. This means a consumer can experience the complete purchase circle on a single platform. From stumbling upon a product to reading more about it on the profile, asking queries through DM’s and making purchases on the platform itself, everything is possible without switching a tab, page or website. Although this feature is still in its early stages, the ecosystem has well understood the growth potential it has to offer. After all, all their customers are here and moreover, these platforms are their preferred medium of consuming information.

The new age consumers go big on immersive experiences. They do not believe in watching from the sidelines. At each and every step of interaction, they want to play a central role. Betting big on social commerce has enabled us to gather data points to understand our consumers’ behaviour, shopping habits and patterns, thus strong-arming us in creating customised experiences. Enabling live commerce is set to become a win-win situation for both consumers and brands. Consumers are able to get responses to their queries in real time, thus simplifying their shopping experience with an added touch of convenience. Now consumers do not need to hop over websites or counters for answers, everything is available to them on the same screen. On the other hand, we brands become more equipped to deliver a positive customer experience.

Opportunity for personal care brands

Consumer experience has evolved over the years. As a brand, we all have realised the need to create an experience for our customers as well as make an emotional connection with them. People nowadays buy products only if they trust the brand and feel a certain level of emotion towards it. That’s where social and live commerce comes into the picture. It provides personal care brands with better content options, allowing us to engage with potential customers in a more effective manner. Being a brand is not just about selling products, it is about telling a story and educating people.

The new-age medium assists us in developing our identities while also emerging as a major sales channel. When combined with creativity, investing in social commerce can be extremely rewarding. Millennials and Gen Z are willing to spend money if they connect with brands and agree with their ideas. Thus for us, tapping into the customers’ emotions and insights can go a long way. Social and live commerce provides detailed consumer insights for understanding consumer behaviour and bridges the gap between brands and consumers. The ongoing feedback from customers aids in the continuous improvement of the brand.

This fusion of social and live commerce has been booming and will continue to boom in this tech age. I believe this is an ideal time to invest time in the new-age channel and stay at top of what is happening in the market.

The author is the co-founder and CEO of Pilgrim

Also Read: 2 in 3 households prefer connected TV as the primary mode to access TV: Report

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