Facebook and Instagram Shops are ideal platforms to grow your business. You can sell your products to reach a wider customer base and target potential customers with specific interests. It makes sharing (viral marketing) your content much easier than sticking to one platform only. This feature is introduced by Facebook to ease the disruption by the COVID-19 pandemic. It's a section within your Business Facebook page and Instagram profile to showcase your products in a way that offers a seamless shopping experience. This provides retailers an opportunity to survive through the COVID-19 storm and gain even more customers than before.

Convert your profile to a “Business Account” before you get started with the steps below! This change will help find metrics easier like profile visits, website clicks, reach, and impressions.

1. The first step to selling on Facebook and Instagram is to set up a Commerce Account for your business. To start, you have to go to Facebook Commerce Manager and follow the instructions below to get started.

• When you reach Commerce Manager page, click “Start Selling”

• Select which shop you want, if you wish to continue with Facebook click on the icon to the left.

When you fill in every required information, click “Get Started”.

2. After you set up your Commerce Account, upload your products to a catalog. A catalog collects all the inventory you want to feature on our Commerce platform. Add a product title, images or videos, include a product description, features and sizing. Fill in the information about delivery and returns policy. While Facebook is reviewing the information, the product will display as ‘Processing’.

• After logging into Catalog Manager click on “Create Catalog” and it will redirect you to this page so you can start creating your catalog.

• In the Home page of Catalog Manager, you can see all of your catalogs and add products to each of them.

You can either add Products manually, by a bulk update or by using a pixel. If you choose to do it manually a page like this will appear and ask you to put in this information about the product.

After adding your products, you will have the option to manage all of them on your “Products” tab to the left.

Commerce Manager will keep track of orders and purchases made on Facebook and Instagram. Analytics tools are present in the Commerce Manager to help you understand the performance of your shop. The performance can be determined by how you serve your customers and their feedback. 

Many SME's in the United Arab Emirates use ecommerce through Facebook and Instagram shops as it make shopping seamless and empower anyone from a small business owner to a global brand to reach their customers. If you are a business owner and want to boost your brand by branching out to new platforms, it is recommended for you to start with Facebook and Instagram shop. If you need help with the setup and advertisement, reaching out to an online selling industry expert is a way to setup and start your first advertisement.