Instagram’s looking to further its in-stream commerce push with the launch of a new ‘10 Days of Live Shopping’ event, which will feature a range of celebrities streaming product launches in the app, showcasing the capacity of live-stream shopping for connecting with Instagram’s audience.
As explained by Instagram:
“Fashion, beauty, music, and lifestyle are coming together like never before with Instagram’s 10+ Days of Live Shopping. People can tune in starting September 1st for intimate events with Selena Gomez, Kacey Musgraves, Lil Yachty, and more surprise guests. The events give you access to fresh releases, offers, and exclusive merch only on Instagram. “
As Instagram notes, the event will feature various celebrities showcasing new products, in conjunction with major brands (mostly their own labels), with planned streams running all throughout the month.
Users will be able to tune into these events by visiting the new “Live” destination in the Shop tab, a dedicated space within Instagram’s shopping experience for commerce-specific streams.
The combination of exclusive products, and the opportunity to engage with celebrities, in real-time, will no doubt draw in big audiences, which will provide the perfect opportunity for Instagram to showcase its evolving eCommerce options ahead of the holiday push.
Commerce has been a key focus for the app over the past two years, starting with the arrival of Instagram Shops, which Facebook fast-tracked in order to latch onto the pandemic-induced eCommerce shift. The bigger picture view is that, eventually, every Instagram image and video will become ‘shoppable’, with creators and/or Facebook’s systems tagging related items in each frame, which will then lead to new habitual usage behaviors that will see more and more people shopping on Instagram more regularly, providing new monetization options for the app.
Really, that would be the ideal scenario for all social apps, with each platform now exploring their own eCommerce potential, in varying ways, as they look to expand usage behaviors, and provide more incentive for brands to build more presence in, and reliance on their apps.
Both Facebook and YouTube are leading the way on object recognition within video clips, with YouTube already experimenting with automated object tags that could eventually provide more direct product options linked to each clip. Facebook is investigating the same, and with interest in live-stream shopping also on the rise, it’s additionally working on new showcase options for streams, extending purchase activity even further within the app.
Indeed, according to Facebook’s own research, published earlier this year, consumers are increasingly keen to try out live shopping, with 89% of people expressing an interest in the option.
Couple that interest with popular celebrities, and you’re likely on a winner, and it’ll be interesting to see what sort of response Facebook receives for its new shopping events, and how that then guides their approach to live-stream shopping moving forward.
At the same time, TikTok’s live-stream shopping options are also advancing.
That’s another factor in Instagram’s new push, and by utilizing the reach of these high profile users, it’ll be hoping to hook more users into its live-shopping experience, which will then lead to greater usage of its new Live shopping tab within its shopping tools, providing ongoing potential for brands, even those without celebrity endorsement.
It could be a big move, especially, again, as we lead into the holiday shopping period.
Instagram’s new Live Shopping showcase is now available at this link (on mobile only).
