On average, Facebook users spend over 40 minutes per day on the social network with a large portion of that going towards shopping.

This is the single reason why you need to start selling your products on Facebook today.

If you’re based in the US, customers can checkout and pay directly through your Facebook Shop but if you’re anywhere else in the world you’ll need to link the product to your eCommerce website to allow customers to checkout.

Benefits of a Facebook Shop

What’s great about Facebook Shops is you don’t need any other online presence or experience to make it work, you can run your entire business through Facebook if you wanted to.

But the benefits don’t end there, with Facebook Shops you can:

  • Add unlimited products to your page
  • Organise your products into categories and collections
  • Easily communicate with your customers through the page
  • Access all relevant analytics and stats about your page
  • Appear in Facebook Marketplace, greatly expanding your potential customer base

And you don’t want to underestimate that Facebook Marketplace benefit, that’s over 800 million monthly users potentially searching for your product.

How To Set Up My Facebook Shop

If you aren’t already aware, everyone can create a Facebook Shop page and start selling to their followers basically immediately.

Here’s what you need to get started:

  • A Facebook account
  • A Facebook business page

Those two shouldn’t be a problem and you’ll likely already have a business page so we won’t be covering their setup today but if you have any trouble just have a quick search online.

Apart from those two requirements, your Facebook page must also adhere to the following:

  • Sell physical items, no digital or downloadable products.
  • Agree with Facebook’s Merchant Terms

Step 1: Configure Your Shop Page

First you’ll want to navigate to your Facebook page and look for the Shop tab, in the same section as Home, Posts, Reviews, etc.

If you can’t find it then you’ll need to change your template, go to Settings → Templates and Tabs.

Find the Current Template area and click the Edit button.

Then select the Shopping template, some of the others have the Shop tab as well but the Shopping template will work best for most stores.

Now that you have the Shop tab on your page, click on it.

Step 2: Set Up Your Shop Details

Clicking on the Shop tab will first show you the Merchant Terms agreement box, you’ll need to agree to these before you can continue.

Next, you’ll have to choose the method in which orders will be handled.

Depending on your country, you might not see this next panel but instead get redirected straight to the Shop creation page instead.

  • Message to Buy is the most straightforward option, whenever someone wants to buy a product, you’ll get a message (through Facebook Messenger) and it’s then up to you to communicate with the customer, agree on the details and complete the sale.
  • Check Out on Another Website is arguably a more user-friendly approach where everything is taken care of by your separate eCommerce website.

The first option requires no external platforms and every step of the process is handled through Facebook but the downside is all the manual work involved that comes from all the messages you’ll receive.

The other option is completely self-sufficient and allows the customer to choose the products they want and checkout themselves but this isn’t 100% Facebook shopping, but more about driving traffic to your online store.

The obvious disadvantage is that you need to own an eCommerce store but luckily getting one isn’t that difficult and White Peak Digital can set an affordable one up for your business today, just get in touch.

The short answer is:

  • If you only have a handful of orders per day and don’t have an eCommerce store setup then go with Message to Buy.
  • If you have an online store running on any eCommerce platform then go with Check Out on Another Website.

Next, you’ll simply need to select your currency and then click Save.

Step 3: Add a Product to Your Shop

Adding products to your Facebook Shop is fairly straight forward.

Simply click Add Product, fill out each field and then click Save.

  • Product photos or videos are essential, you’ll want to upload at least one picture of your product but multiple is always better. If it’s relevant, you can also add a video as well.
  • Name and Description are pretty self-explanatory, get creative or simply copy them from your existing eCommerce store.
  • Price. It isn’t really a product without this one crucial detail but you can also put it on sale with the toggle button underneath.
  • Checkout URL only appears if you selected ‘Check Out on Another Website’ during the initial Facebook Shop setup. This is the specific URL in your eCommerce store where the product can be purchased, simply navigate to the product page on your website and copy the link from your address bar and paste it in the Checkout URL field.
  • Share this product on your Page. You can tick this box to share the product on your page as soon as it’s approved.
  • Visibility should always be set to Public.
  • Product condition should be left on New unless you’re selling second-hand goods.

Click Save to add the product to your Shop page.

Step 4: Manage Your Shop

To view your existing products, collections and orders navigate to Publishing Tools in the main menu of your page.

Down the left-hand side you’ll see a Shop section with all these tabs laid out, simply click through to manage your products, update your collections or view pending orders.

Wrapping Up

You’re now ready to start selling your products on Facebook Shops!

Things often change with Facebook, so if you ever need further assistance check out this page from the Facebook Help Centre.

If you have any questions about creating your Facebook Shop feel free to reach out to us directly through our Facebook Page!

To your success,
Jackson