By Glenn Taylor, Associate Editor
The introduction of the buy button in retail has raised a lot of chatter throughout the industry over the past year, but there’s just one problem: the buttons still garner very low interest among consumers.
GlobalWebIndex revealed that most users of the major social media platforms between the ages of 16 and 64 do not have an interest in buy buttons. Of the five social networks included in the survey, Tumblr had the highest rate of consumers interested in the buttons, but that was only 17%. This was followed by Instagram (14%), Pinterest (13%) and then Twitter (12%). Facebook comes in dead last with only 9% showing any interest in the buttons.
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As far as progress that might attract additional attention, some of the social networks have been more proactive than others. Pinterest has managed to fully flesh out its buy buttons, called Buyable Pins, with the company partnering with more than 10,000 businesses. Twitter promoted its Buy Now option in September when it announced a partnership with e-Commerce platforms Bigcommerce, Demandware and Shopify.
Facebook, on the other hand, is still in a “beta test” with Shopify, and hasn’t yet opened the service to the public even though these tests have been ongoing since July 2014. Other than these tidbits, there hasn’t been much info as to where these social networks plan on extending the buttons, what goals they are looking to achieve with them, or how they will define success with them. Moreover, there haven’t been any statistics released by any of the companies as to how much revenue the buttons are generating.
Given that the holiday season is already halfway over, it is actually pretty surprising that very little headway has been made on the buttons since the topic gained popularity in early 2015. The fact that there wasn’t much hype leading into the season brings into question whether these social networks are even considering buy buttons as a high priority item at all.
One would think that the buy button would be a perfect asset for today’s shopping environment, especially as mobile usage continues to skyrocket. Consumers are continuing to use their phones and tablets to jumpstart, guide through and complete the purchase process at any point. The buttons serve as a one-click alternative to the many clunky, disjointed experiences that many retailers unfortunately still deliver on their mobile sites.
With consumers demonstrating only a small interest in the buttons, even on visually oriented sites such as Instagram and Pinterest, it is apparent that these messages may be flat-out missing the mark from a personalization level.
Retailers have been able to create successful social promotions in the past through user-generated content (UGC), which has been known to further brand loyalty among consumers. Bringing UGC into the mix as a testimonial to the product being offered would perhaps provide a better introduction than a typical buy button, which often appears like an advertisement.
Whether the problem lies in the execution of the buy buttons themselves or consumers’ insistence on making purchases their own way, the buttons haven’t shone through in their first holiday season. If retailers aren’t able to gain traction from the buy buttons soon, then in all likelihood the trend will never get beyond its trial phase.
