Ottawa’s ecommerce tech giant Shopify has launched an integration with YouTube to allow its merchants to connect with consumers on the world’s largest video-sharing platform.
With the launch of YouTube Shopping, Shopify businesses can sell their full product suite on YouTube via livestreams, videos, and through a new store tab that will be added to the vendor’s YouTube channel. An earlier version of this new feature was initially reported in 2020.
Since Shopify functions as the business’ retail operating system, product details such as names, images, pricing, and shipping are kept up-to-date across channels. Merchants can also track the performance of live and on-demand videos from their Shopify admin, with a full view of multichannel sales.
For select eligible vendors in the United States, consumers can purchase their products without leaving YouTube.
Before launching Youtube Shopping, Shopify’s director of product Amir Kabbara told BetaKit that merchants may have linked products in a video description, creating a disconnected experience for buyers that sent them off of YouTube. This new integration is meant to create a seamless path to purchase directly from YouTube.
Shopify’s integration with YouTube is the Canadian tech company’s most recent bid to expand into the creator economy and further its push into social commerce.
Most recently, Shopify became the first ecommerce platform to partner with Twitter to launch a shopping feature on the social media site.
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In 2020, Shopify signed a similar deal with short video-sharing app TikTok and Facebook.
Shopify later expanded its partnership with TikTok to allow TikTok users to shop directly on the social media app in 2021.
Tapping into the music industry, Shopify also teamed up with digital music streaming service Spotify last year to allow artists to connect their Shopify store on their Spotify profile.
Shopify previously worked with image sharing platform Pinterest in 2014 to launch Rich Pins, a feature attached to a photo of a product or “pin” that contains details such as price and stock availability.
Pinterest’s partnership with Shopify was officially established in 2020, as the two collaborated on a Pinterest app that provided Shopify merchants with the ability to upload product catalogues to Pinterest and convert their products into “pins.” This was later made available to 27 additional countries last year.
This latest integration with YouTube expands on Shopify’s ongoing partnership with YouTube’s parent company, Google (Alphabet). In May last year, Shopify announced that it is expanding its accelerated checkout solution, Shop Pay, to Google.