E-commerce, particularly social commerce (buying and selling products on social media), has blown up over the past year or so. This is good for Instagram, which has probably lost a lot of its revenue to Apple’s new prompt that asks users whether they want to be tracked (most of them don’t).
The photo-sharing app is upgrading its Shop tab to cater to the many consumers that are shopping online now more than ever.
Keep Posted on What Products Your Favorite Brands Drop
In order to help sellers create buzz for their catalogs, Instagram has added Drops to its shopping tab—a dedicated space for users to find the latest and upcoming product launches.
The new section highlights product releases from brands that you’ve engaged with (left a like or comment on one of their posts) in the past, or brands that the algorithm thinks you’d be interested in. You can also opt to receive notifications about products you’re interested in.
When viewing a brand, you can take a look at their products’ info, like its price and when the product will be available (or when it became available if it is already). Like normal Instagram posts, products can be bookmarked and shared via direct messages.
Additionally, you can buy things from Drops directly inside the app via Checkout. There’s no messy redirecting to any third-party sites, which makes for a smoother experience while on your shopping spree.
Instagram Focuses on Its Creators and Partnered Brands
Instagram added the Reels and Shop tabs to its homepage in November 2020, and since then, the Facebook-owned app has really pushed to help both content creators and brands that use it help advertise.
It was just recently that Instagram launched access to new insight tools for Professional account users. An app researcher has also leaked the company’s plans to soon pay its top Reel creators with bonuses.
You might be wondering what all this is about—and if we had to guess, we’d say it’s an attempt to recoup losses in revenue following the Apple’s privacy crackdown. After all, a vast majority of users opt out of app tracking, which is how Facebook and Instagram made most of their money prior to the iOS 14.5 update.
Drops is only accessible in the US, and via the iOS and Android apps. We don’t know when the feature will roll out worldwide, or if it’ll ever arrive on the desktop site.
