The Facebook platform is the most used social media platform around the world by all age groups. In Egypt alone, there are more than 50 million active users on the platform.
This made it the preferred marketing platform for its users, as it is used to explore goods, services and products for purchase, or to find out the opinions of previous buyers about them.
How many times have you and I searched on Facebook first for the products we want, even if only in order to know their prices, and therefore the majority of entrepreneurs and project owners resorted to it to reach their customers and display their products through them.
This prompted Meta - previously Facebook - to make some powerful updates to help business owners develop their business, facilitate their access to customers and increase their sales.
This is what we will also help you do through this article, in which we will discuss how to make a store to sell products on Facebook.
Where we will discuss topics such as: what is the Facebook Store, its features and the steps to create it, and we will also review the difference between it and the Marketplace, so be sure to read the entire article.
Steps to create a store to sell products on Facebook
According to the definition of the Meta platform, a “Facebook store” is an interface for your online store that enables you to display your products through it for shoppers to browse, explore and purchase directly through Facebook.
And this is through a set of tools and solutions that help you practice the buying and selling process through Facebook with ease, and build your brand. If you own an online store or a physical store, you can create it as an extension of the other store.
You may be wondering now how can I create a store for my business on Facebook, in the coming lines I will tell you about the steps in detail.
The first step: create a store page to sell products on Facebook
A prerequisite for opening your store on Facebook is that you have a page. If you do not have a page, you can create it through your Facebook account with ease.
You just need to add some simple data:
- Page name.
- page category.
- Page description.
And then when you click on the create page button you will have your own store page.
Second Step: Join the Facebook Shops service
After you have created your shop page, you need to join the Facebook Shops service, and you can do this in several ways.
The easiest way is to scroll down your page to access the free Facebook Business Tools, and then choose to sell your products.
Step three: Set up your store
After you click on Sell your products, you will have to go through some necessary steps to set up your store.
You will initially have to choose the method of completing the purchase:
Where you can choose to complete the purchase on another website, such as: your online store on Shopify or WooCommerce, for example.
Or you can choose to complete the purchase through messaging on Messenger, which allows you to coordinate payment options and other details directly with the customer.
Step 4: Link your business account to your store
In this step you will have to link your business account to your Facebook store:
This gives you access to the Commerce Manager, which helps you manage your product inventory and gain insights into it.
In this step, you can either link your store to an existing business account or create a new account.
Fifth Step: Create a catalog of your products
It is an inventory of the products you want to sell, and in order to enter the step of adding your products, you must create a catalog, just name the catalog, agree to the terms of the catalog manager, and then click Next.
And if you do not have a clear knowledge of how you will arrange your catalog or what you are supposed to do, look at competitor catalogs and learn from them.
Step Six: Submit the store for review
After completing the previous steps, you will have to submit your store for review by Facebook technical support, as it needs their approval in order to publish it publicly.
The review may take a while, and may take some days, so don't worry, this is not evidence that there is a problem with your store.
Step Seven: Customize your store
Customizing your store is a step where you can choose the look of your store. The new store builder window will appear after you submit your store for review.
In the beginning, you can either watch the auxiliary media provided by the tool, such as videos, questions, and tools.
Or you can immediately start customizing your store, where you can choose the appearance of products, text colors, links and buttons, and your changes will be applied when you agree to publish your store.
Eighth Step: Add products to your page
You can add products to your Facebook store in three ways:
1. Manual addition : This is the best option in the case of digital and stationary products, as they do not change much, and this is done by adding each product alone and specifying its image, description and price.
2. Bulk upload : This option is for adding a large number of products at once via, for example, an Excel table, so that products are automatically added from the table when it is updated and other products are added, and this is the best option for people who have multiple products.
3. Using Pixel : Products are updated automatically, preferably in large stores that are constantly changing, and this is done by adding a pixel code to the online store on the web, and the products are displayed automatically when adding the inventory of the online store.
You can easily access the option to add products by clicking on Add Collection from the home page.
And after you write the name of the collection and click on add a new product:
Then you will add the products and their descriptions and details:
Choose the method that suits you best and add several images of the product, the appropriate title for the products to attract customers, their description, the link to the webstore, the price before and after the discount, and the name of the brand.
Then click on Next, and you will be taken to the “Display Options” section, through which you can determine the status of the product, whether it is available or not, and by the end of this step, you will have completed the steps for making a store to sell products on Facebook.
In this way, you have created a store to sell products on Facebook, but there are some points related to the creation process:
- Facebook Stores currently only support physical products, but soon they will also support digital products.
- The steps and requirements for creating a store to sell products on Facebook vary from country to country, and will change as the Facebook Stores activity expands.
- If you are creating a Facebook store from the United States of America, you will be able to sell directly on Facebook, but you will need to enter your bank account data and some other tax and other data.
And Facebook is a great way to put your business on the web, and it provides all the tools that enable you to manage your store such as managing inventory easily and for free.
Finally, there are many other advantages that will accrue to your business from making a store to sell products on Facebook, which we will now mention.
Advantages of making a store to sell products on Facebook
There are many advantages that you will get used to, the most important of which are:
1. Creating a store to sell products on Facebook is very easy, and any beginner can do this task by following the steps we mentioned in the article.
2. You can add an unlimited number of products to your store, and you can organize these products into categories and groups dedicated to each product, making it easier for customers to find the product they want.
3. You can create a collection of products and display them in various groups that include several products to make it easier for your audience to find them easily by naming each collection with a specific name, such as “Summer Collection for Boys” through the Brand Manager, by doing the following:
Click on Edit >> Add New >> Choose a squad >> Click on Create a new squad >> Start selecting the name of the squad >> Click on the Confirm option.
4. Unlike the traditional store, the store on Facebook has no opening and closing times. It is available to shoppers 24 hours and is not affected by any holidays or holidays that lead to its closure. Customers can explore it at any hour, and you receive their orders at any time, which increases your profits.
5. The Facebook store enables you to display your products on the FB Marketplace and the Instagram store, which will make you reach a larger number of customers. It also allows you to display your products on your Facebook and Instagram page, and you can reach a large number of customers and communicate with them through these pages.
6. Ease of reaching customers all over and targeting them with marketing strategies on social media, such as: content marketing , stories, reels, live broadcasts, and funded ads on Facebook and Instagram, which leads to an increase in your sales and thus an increase in your profits.
7. The store is distinguished by quickly responding to customer inquiries and questions about your products, whether through the Messenger Bot service to respond to the customer, and this service will help you respond to customers in an immediate manner and reduce problems that may arise due to a delayed response or lack of response, which may lead to the failure of the sale process and not completing it.
8. Ease of measuring performance, whether for the store or marketing efforts, through analysis tools and insights provided by Facebook on sales performance, insights about products and content provided, customer visits and behavior in the store, as well as where they visit and other reports on this vision can also be extracted if you sell directly through the Facebook store.
9. Facebook provides you with marketing tips and advice, and customized tools that suit your activity and your sales and marketing goals.
10. Through the store, you can easily import products from the online store.
How do you market your online store?
After creating a store to sell products on Facebook, you will encounter a new obstacle, which is marketing those products in order to sell them.
Therefore, we will provide you with some guaranteed methods that will help you in marketing your store:
1. Funded ads: Paid advertising campaigns may help you reach your customers quickly, in which you pay some money in exchange for reaching the target audience, and it may help you to get a lot of sales.
2. Content marketing: There is a lot of talk that can be said at this point, but in order to shorten the time, I will refer you to an article that we previously published on the site, entitled: How to write content that sells your product with practical steps .
3. Using influencers: Recently, Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok celebrities have played a major role in promoting products and increasing their sales requests. This would be a good step to publicize your store by having a famous person make a video talking about your store, your products, and their advantages, in exchange for some money or gifts. of the products you offer.
4. Subscribe to groups related to your activity on Facebook: When you add a new product to your store on Facebook, also display it in groups related to what you offer, and interact with the posts in these groups to make your store famous.
And also talk about your products in these groups by posting on them and receiving customer comments, so describe them as a real description and talk about their advantages. You can also create a group for your store and start adding the audience and displaying your content through it.
5. Using marketing tools: such as stories, real-time clips , videos , and live broadcasts. These tools play a big role in attracting customers' attention to what you offer.
Tips to increase your profits after creating a store to sell products on Facebook
After we explained the full steps of how a store to sell products on Facebook works and talked about its advantages and how to market it.
Here are some very important tips that will help you make more money from your store:
1. You must stay abreast of the latest developments in the Facebook stores, as updates and developments are issued to improve the performance of the stores, and it is preferable that you be aware of them first.
2. Online shopping has become preferred by the majority now because it saves them time and effort and delivers products to their door without any fatigue, so be sure to choose the best e-commerce shipping company to ensure that orders arrive on time and not be late for the customer to continue dealing with you.
3. Be aware that there are some products that Facebook prohibits from offering for sale, including “pets, medicines, weapons, and alcohol.”
4. Determine what is your goal in creating a Facebook store: completing the buying and selling process through it, or obtaining traffic for your store through it, or what?
5. Building your visual identity that establishes your brand in the minds of customers and helps you become their preferred store.
6. Make sure to write the data for each product very accurately, as the product name and description must be clear, and the description must be real and written in a smooth manner, and it includes a CTA or an invitation to make a purchase decision in order to make it easier for the customer to make a decision quickly.
7. Do not write on the free price so as not to deceive your store visitors, and write the price of each product accurately and correctly before and after the discount, and clarify the price of shipping and payment upon receipt.
8. Learn from supermarkets, study competitors, and try to overcome their weaknesses and pitfalls and outperform them.
9. Take care of your customers by responding to their comments and messages as soon as possible.
10. Make sure that the image of each product is clear, and stay away from putting pictures from the Internet, just assign a professional product photographer to photograph your products so that you can put their pictures on nature.
11. Specify the method of completing the purchase and the method of payment. Always try to find and solve customer problems.
What is the difference between the store you are going to make and the Facebook Marketplace
And after we explained to you what the Facebook store is, how it works and its features, now we will explain to you the difference between the Facebook store and Market Place, so that you can choose the best among them for you and start selling on Facebook .
Facebook Marketplace
It is a service and a place for buying and selling products on Facebook, as it allows you to display your products and view the products of others, but it is allocated according to the geographical region.
That is, if you live in Cairo and you display your products, they will appear to those who live in Cairo only, and so on, so you will not be able to expand your business beyond the borders of your region.
This service is free, and the products are categorized into groups with sub-sections. It also does not support providing a payment method, but only provides a display of products.
Facebook store
It gives you the opportunity to expand your business outside the borders of your country, increase customers and thus increase profits and capital.
It provides you with the ability to display products differently on the platform that many shoppers prefer, and enables you to promote and market them.
It also allows you to create a store page and link it to your account on Instagram and your store on the web, and your store's products can also be displayed on Facebook Marketplace.