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Crucial information from Shopify: "Merchants will get control over customization and merchandising for their storefronts inside Facebook and Instagram, while m

Crucial information from Shopify: "Merchants will get control over customization and merchandising for their storefronts inside Facebook and Instagram, while managing their products, inventory, orders, and fulfillment directly from within Shopify." "Consumers will be able to easily find, browse, and buy products through a purpose-built, immersive experience in these apps they use every day. Checkout will be powered by Shopify for merchants, with Shopify also offering Instagram Checkout to select merchants testing the new feature." Facebook wants to capture all discovery through FB and Insta directly competing with Amazon and Google Shopping.

saltedonion 6y ago
Discovery is where the money is at. If FB can dominate discovery they will effectively commoditize the product listing, inventory management layer.
- rad_gruchalski 6y ago
  Meh. People who don’t use facebook can’t discover anything. I know many who removed their facebook account and are not going back. That’s not to say there aren’t many on facebook who will use this.
skybrian 6y ago
It seems like you want to sell through multiple channels without being too dependent on any one of them? This could be a very good channel for some early adopters, but then the economics of it could change pretty quickly.
moneywoes 6y ago
Don't they also have a checkout platform coming in the future? Wouldn't that be a good Shopify competitor.
tjbiddle 6y ago
There's been a Shopify->Facebook/Instagram integration for ages. Personally, I found it to be pretty garbage - but I'm sure they've gained a ton of data while running it. Facebook Shop just sounds like the next evolution of this.
buboard 6y ago
FB should be merciful and buy shopify before murdering them
- Lio 6y ago
  I don’t know. I realise I’m atypical but I don’t use Facebook products. I won’t shop with sites powered by Facebook so there must be at least some segment of the market that Shopify can still hold.
- sbarre 6y ago
  I think there's a place for FB Shops, mostly with "small-small" businesses, think "kiosks in the middle of the mall" or "plastic two-colour sign stapled to electrical poles" type of small, but any reasonable business that cares about it's brand and wants to maintain control over itself would still likely be attracted to a more flexible and powerful platform like Shopify.. You give up a lot of control when you use FB, they control branding, UI, UX, etc.. if you don't care about those things and you just want to sell stuff, that's probably fine.. I say this of course without knowing what the future holds for FB Shops.. Facebook is basically already the shopping mall food court and bus stop, they're just adding the stores now I guess..
- codecamper 6y ago
  FB should pay 100 billion for Shopify?? For 1 million "merchants"? in other words $100k per merchant. Many of these are t-shirt & mug sales sort of people.
CivBase 6y ago
> Facebook wants to capture all discovery through FB and Insta directly competing with Amazon and Google Shopping. I don't have a Facebook account. As a result, I cannot "discover" anything on the platform. Facebook continues to become a less popular platform and their name continues to loose value thanks to constant involvement in scandals. I may be a minority, but I suspect I'm part of a growing minority. I can't imagine many shops using this as a primary storefront and I can't imagine this offering much value to small businesses as a supplemental storefront. Besides, who would be naive enough to trust Facebook with the primary storefront for a serious business? They have no obligation to create a good experience for sellers. All they care about is feeding the ad machine with more user data.
- woodrowbarlow 6y ago
  there was a period when i thought similarly (pretty soon, facebook won't be "cool" anymore) but it came and went. people are complaining more about facebook's disturbing moves, but they're not doing anything about it.
  - CivBase 6y ago
    I think it's happening. It's just very slow. Most people wont delete their account. They'll just start using it less and less. Facebook hasn't been "cool" for a long time. It's not a platform most people want to be on. It's just so ubiquitous that many people feel obligated to be on it. Unless that changes, Facebook (the social media site, not the company) will continue to die a very slow death.
    - redblacktree 6y ago
      Exactly the case for me. I just routed facebook.com to 127.0.0.1 in my hosts file. I realized that I was going there out of habit and I always felt worse when I was done. It's been one of the best things I've done this year.
- juuyan 6y ago
  Yet Facebook Shops would integrate to not only Facebook but also Ins, Whatsapp, isn't it?

saltedonion 6y ago

Discovery is where the money is at. If FB can dominate discovery they will effectively commoditize the product listing, inventory management layer.

rad_gruchalski 6y ago
Meh. People who don’t use facebook can’t discover anything. I know many who removed their facebook account and are not going back. That’s not to say there aren’t many on facebook who will use this.

skybrian 6y ago

It seems like you want to sell through multiple channels without being too dependent on any one of them? This could be a very good channel for some early adopters, but then the economics of it could change pretty quickly.

moneywoes 6y ago

Don't they also have a checkout platform coming in the future? Wouldn't that be a good Shopify competitor.

tjbiddle 6y ago

There's been a Shopify->Facebook/Instagram integration for ages. Personally, I found it to be pretty garbage - but I'm sure they've gained a ton of data while running it. Facebook Shop just sounds like the next evolution of this.

buboard 6y ago

FB should be merciful and buy shopify before murdering them

Lio 6y ago
I don’t know. I realise I’m atypical but I don’t use Facebook products. I won’t shop with sites powered by Facebook so there must be at least some segment of the market that Shopify can still hold.
sbarre 6y ago
I think there's a place for FB Shops, mostly with "small-small" businesses, think "kiosks in the middle of the mall" or "plastic two-colour sign stapled to electrical poles" type of small, but any reasonable business that cares about it's brand and wants to maintain control over itself would still likely be attracted to a more flexible and powerful platform like Shopify.. You give up a lot of control when you use FB, they control branding, UI, UX, etc.. if you don't care about those things and you just want to sell stuff, that's probably fine.. I say this of course without knowing what the future holds for FB Shops.. Facebook is basically already the shopping mall food court and bus stop, they're just adding the stores now I guess..
codecamper 6y ago
FB should pay 100 billion for Shopify?? For 1 million "merchants"? in other words $100k per merchant. Many of these are t-shirt & mug sales sort of people.

CivBase 6y ago

> Facebook wants to capture all discovery through FB and Insta directly competing with Amazon and Google Shopping. I don't have a Facebook account. As a result, I cannot "discover" anything on the platform. Facebook continues to become a less popular platform and their name continues to loose value thanks to constant involvement in scandals. I may be a minority, but I suspect I'm part of a growing minority. I can't imagine many shops using this as a primary storefront and I can't imagine this offering much value to small businesses as a supplemental storefront. Besides, who would be naive enough to trust Facebook with the primary storefront for a serious business? They have no obligation to create a good experience for sellers. All they care about is feeding the ad machine with more user data.

woodrowbarlow 6y ago
there was a period when i thought similarly (pretty soon, facebook won't be "cool" anymore) but it came and went. people are complaining more about facebook's disturbing moves, but they're not doing anything about it.
- CivBase 6y ago
  I think it's happening. It's just very slow. Most people wont delete their account. They'll just start using it less and less. Facebook hasn't been "cool" for a long time. It's not a platform most people want to be on. It's just so ubiquitous that many people feel obligated to be on it. Unless that changes, Facebook (the social media site, not the company) will continue to die a very slow death.
  - redblacktree 6y ago
    Exactly the case for me. I just routed facebook.com to 127.0.0.1 in my hosts file. I realized that I was going there out of habit and I always felt worse when I was done. It's been one of the best things I've done this year.
juuyan 6y ago
Yet Facebook Shops would integrate to not only Facebook but also Ins, Whatsapp, isn't it?