Please unmute the video player to listen to the video.
Join the conversations around Discovery Commerce with Milad Samia, Agency Solutions Manager MENA, Meta and Rasha Rteil, Regional Director of Digital transformation and eCommerce, Reprise MENA to learn all about this trend from the agency perspective and how to use the various tools to drive higher ROI for your marketing campaigns.
Change can happen in an instant but can spark a response that’s just as fast. Just take the disruption that came with Covid-19, which accelerated the shift to e-commerce by five years.[1] If the pandemic proved anything, it’s that shopping is no longer a functional task; it’s now a curated experience, with people going online with more interest than ever. “Going shopping” has become “always shopping”.
What is Discovery Commerce?
For agencies, keeping up with the momentum of e-commerce often rests in their ability to adapt their media strategies in line with our advancing digital world. They must challenge audience planning stereotypes and close the marketing gap between consumer media behaviour and advertising—something which is becoming increasingly accessible through a system we call, Discovery Commerce.
Have you ever come across the perfect product on Instagram just by chance, whether it was a pair of running trainers for the start of your marathon training or a baby hamper for the new arrival in the family? That’s Meta’s Discovery Commerce — using Machine Learning, the system anticipates what people want before they know they want it, saving them from pinning their finite time against an infinite digital shelf of products.
Why should agencies be interested?
“Data-driven marketing is an essential component when thinking about commerce strategies. People are served the right ad for the right product at the right time. Rather than people finding products, Discovery Commerce inspires users to try products and brands that align with their tastes, which they might never have come across otherwise. Rather than people finding products, discovery commerce enables products and brands to find people.” says Milad Samia, Agency Solutions Manager MENA, Meta.
By using Discovery Commerce to facilitate these moments of prediction, agencies can go beyond their existing marketing to support their clients in finding new audiences and revenue streams. For too long, media pitches have been driven by cost savings, putting pressure on agencies to maintain the quality of their media impressions against a fixed price.
However, as marketing that goes one step further than e-commerce, Discovery Commerce has the potential to challenge perceptions around media cost. Rather than being viewed as a barrier to business growth, it can be positioned as a true investment. And never has there been a better time to act on this insight than now, with the global social commerce market expecting to reach $1.95 trillion by 2026 and growing at a 29.4% CAGR.[2]
The most advanced marketers are seeing social commerce not just as the entry point to brand and product discovery, but as a way of driving customer retention and life value. With such full-funnel exposure, it offers agencies the opportunity to increase ARPU through cross/upselling and achieve market capitalisation through recurring revenues.
And Rasha Rteil, Regional Director of Digital transformation and eCommerce, Reprise MENA, says Reprise is using machine learning to spot trends and advise e-commerce clients on how to set up their logistics and where to invest for maximum ROI.
How can they get the most out of it?
Clients have a tendency to focus their marketing objectives in one area—be it awareness, acquisition, sales or retention. As a result, their campaigns could be missing out on valuable opportunities across the Meta technologies. To grow their value proposition, agencies must work to help their clients better understand the right objectives, using Discovery Commerce to reach the right people at the right time.
Rteil says: “Predictive commerce is able to determine what people are likely to buy, and what a person or a whole market is likely to buy, based on machine learning. It will advise the brand and the business on when to produce, when to stock up, what season stock might run out and what should be pushed in terms of paid media.
To realize the full potential of the Meta Discovery Commerce system, we believe you should be hitting these four key areas:
- Personalise the customer experience through a strong media setup that meets narrowing privacy restrictions.
- Inspire people with bold creative, delivered on our engaging surfaces and tailored to an evolving environment.
- Convert consumers by building a seamless path to purchase that serves their needs and your objectives.
- Optimise your campaigns with a robust measurement strategy that gives you actionable insights.
Rteil says: “If you are so much in control with automation and artificial intelligence cannot play its role, sometimes you need to let go, and great things happen when you let go. When you do let go and let the machines do what they intend to do, that would be the best practice when it comes to creativity and a way to inspire consumers.”
With the ads ecosystem rapidly evolving to meet the changing expectations of consumers, agencies must empower their clients with the latest marketing innovations now more than ever. Check out Meta’s full ‘Agency Perspective’ series for a deep dive into the four areas of Discovery Commerce and the best way to support your clients on their commerce journeys.
[1] IBM, IBM Us Retail Index, 2020 (Accessed September 2021)
[2] Research and Markets, Global Social Commerce Market By Business Model, By Product Type, By Region, Industry Analysis and Forecast, 2020 – 2026 (Published Jan 2021)
