Shopify is betting high on creator economy as people like to shop as they scroll social media platforms. With Shopify Collabs and partnership with LinkPop and YouTube, the Canadian e-commerce platform is helping creators connect with brands and motivating them to sell merchandise on their own Shopify stores.
Helping With Technology
Bharati Balakrishnan, Director and Country Head – India at Shopify, believes that the creator economy will get the most of milage from India, where social media commerce is expected to skyrocket. Talking to Free Press Journal, Balakrishnan explained how Shopify is helping its merchant partners from India to adapt to technology.
“With social commerce now expected to have 228 million native consumers by the end of 2022, a 45% jump from 2021 as shoppers discover newer ways of buying goods online through YouTube, WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram. As the Indian population becomes more digitally connected, especially in the untapped Tier II and Tier III cities and rural India, the social commerce market in India is expected to skyrocket,” she said.
“Social media platforms have been the ‘go-to’ for independent merchants in India to advertise and promote services through the pandemic,” Balakrishnan.
Empowering Entrepreneurs And Creators
Like the rest of the world, India was also locked down for several months in the COVID-hit 2020. The brick-and-mortar stores suffered substantial losses, though Shopify helped many of these merchants to set up online stores and sell across the internet.
Shopify is now planning to empower “the next generation of Indian entrepreneurs in the creator economy” with the help of YouTube. In July, the e-commerce platform partnered with the video platform to boost sales from content creators. The partnership was aimed to help creators launch their own brands and integrate their online stores with YouTube.
The YouTube integration has initially been launched in the U.S., Brazil and India.
YouTube – World’s Biggest Entertainment Platform
Balakrishnan explained, “Shopify merchants can now integrate directly with one of the world’s biggest entertainment platforms—reaching over 2 billion monthly logged-in users—to meet their consumers where they already are”.
Creators can showcase products on their YouTube videos and live streams. The integration also allows them to add a store tab just below their YouTube channel to feature the entire list of products offered. Creators can also display a curated list of products in a segment below on-demand video.
For a YouTube viewer, the products will be displayed within the video page, which means that the content creator will not have to lose the viewer while selling products. The entire transaction will be completed while the video is being played. This will also let YouTube retain the viewership, which otherwise would have been sacrificed by viewer to purchase products on some other site. YouTube said that it plans to expand the features to its Shorts, Live and long format videos as well.
Balakrishnan spoke about three ways in which merchants and creators can sell products on YouTube. She started with the live streaming option, says “Merchants can tag and pin products at key points during a livestream, and picture-in-picture playback means consumers can watch while they check out”.
Commenting on the feature that allows creators to showcase product shelf below their YouTube videos, Balakrishnan said: “Merchants can show a curated list of products in a product shelf below on-demand videos”.
“A new tab will be added to a merchant’s YouTube channel, featuring their entire selection of products,” she added, explaining the store tab feature.
India’s Brands on Shopify
From India, brands like Lakmé, boAt, SUGAR Cosmetics, Colorbar, Vahdam Teas, Duroflex and Borosil are based on Shopify. Balakrishnan believes that Indian businesses must use multiple channels to reach the right audience.
“Given the size of the Indian market, I believe there’s a role for many channels. Every brand uses a combination of channels to reach and engage with its audience. We are an enabler for brands who want to not only reach their audience directly, but also connect and interact with their consumers,” she said.
“In India, we are for the old and the new and the small and the big. Our focus is to help both new merchants starting their business on Shopify, and also partner with large-scale, high-volume retail businesses like GoColors and Duroflex that are radically transforming their respective industries to best serve their customers,” Balakrishnan added.
Shopify Plus
Balakrishnan claimed that over 15,000 merchants are part of Shopify Plus, which comes with added advantage to sell in a highly competitive e-commerce market. Shopify not only help these merchants to set up online store but also optimise their omni-channel strategy.
“We help these brands quickly launch commerce offerings, connect with their customers, and manage their complexity, instead of focusing on technology implementation. Whether online, offline, mobile or social, brands have the flexibility in approach and Shopify is driving a re-invention of what commerce means for Indian merchants,” she explained.
