Facebook Shops now has over a million outlets and 250 million shoppers

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SMBs exploiting the huge potential of selling via social media

Facebook Shops
(Image credit: Facebook)

Facebook Shops now has over one million active e-commerce outlets operating on the global social media platform.

According to company CEO Mark Zuckerberg, over 250 million people are interacting with the online outlets each month, an impressive fact given Facebook Shops only launched in May 2020.

Facebooks Shops offers businesses of all shapes and sizes a convenient e-commerce hosting platform that lets them create a single online store that’s accessible through both Facebook and Instagram.

During a discussion on Clubhouse yesterday the Facebook head updated key figures involved in the growth of Facebook Shops, including SignalFire principal investor and head of content Josh Constantine, Spotify CEO Daniel Ek and Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke.

Online storefront

Having numerous e-commerce features including a fully customizable online storefront at their disposal is clearly proving popular with businesses. The platform also allows SMBs to sell their products without the need for a standalone shopping cart software package.

The online marketplace initially provided a valuable lifeline for small businesses, including those with physical outlets to continue selling during the first coronavirus lockdown.

“I think this particularly important right now because so many small businesses are moving online to deal with the economic fallout from Covid-19,” Zuckerberg said at the launch of Facebook Shops. “As people are being told to stay home, physical storefronts are having a hard time staying open and millions of people are losing their jobs.”

Facebook has even more ambitious goals set for the next five years too, with user numbers of the e-commerce platform expected to rise still further. The company is also working on a number of additional ways for businesses to sell their wares including tagging products in Facebook Live and Instagram Live videos. 

Rob Clymo
Rob Clymo

Rob Clymo has been a tech journalist for more years than he can actually remember, having started out in the wacky world of print magazines before discovering the power of the internet. Since he's been all-digital he has run the Innovation channel during a few years at Microsoft as well as turning out regular news, reviews, features and other content for the likes of TechRadar, TechRadar Pro, Tom's Guide, Fit&Well, Gizmodo, Shortlist, Automotive Interiors World, Automotive Testing Technology International, Future of Transportation and Electric & Hybrid Vehicle Technology International. In the rare moments he's not working he's usually out and about on one of numerous e-bikes in his collection.