With the recent rise in “social commerce” driven by Facebook and Pinterest, Google has been ramping up its e-commerce strategy to ensure it is not missing out. Generation Z and Millennials prefer platforms like YouTube, TikTok, Snapchat, and Instagram, which has been one of the main drivers of the success of social commerce.
The pandemic has made the need for a better e-commerce platform
even clearer for Google. Many of Google’s advertiser had their marketing budgets
slashed related to travel and retail, while e-commerce has boomed as more people
shop online.
Google is now trying to position YouTube as part of its e-commerce
strategy. In an earnings call earlier this year, Google CEO Sundar Pichai
specifically commented on the potential of shopping on YouTube.
Until now users went to another website to purchase products after reviewing and watching a product video. Google's new plan would cut out the middleman and allow users to directly purchase the product they see without leaving YouTube and Google. For example, viewers can watch product unboxing, makeup or cooking videos and immediately buy featured products through YouTube. In return, YouTube/Google would presumably get a cut of sales.
Google’s end goal is to turn YouTube’s video library into a product catalog where users can click on items they see and buy them directly. As a step into that direction Google has recently also announced a new integration with Shopify for selling items through YouTube. The YouTube software will allow creators of videos to tag and track products featured in their clips. The data will then be linked to analytics and shopping tools from Google.
For now it seems that Google is just testing this new
e-commerce platform on YouTube but if successfully implemented it would allow Google
to further build out its market dominance by gathering even more consumer data that
is valuable for advertising purposes.
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