Tweet to Buy

If you follow technology news, you may have heard about Chirpify.com earlier this month and are wondering what it is and if it can help your business with sales. Chirpify is a social commerce company that enables people to buy, sell, donate, fundraise and pay in-stream on social media.

This means, Chirpify allows people to buy products or donate to causes with a tweet, comment or reply on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Consumers don't need to leave the social media platform they are on to transact.

It’s been in the news because the company added more payment options for consumers. This makes it less expensive for sellers because they can choose payment methods beyond Paypal, allowing them to avoid double fees (Paypal and Chirpify fees) for selling.  Now, major credit and debit cards are accepted along with PayPal and bank accounts. Chirpify charges enterprise sellers 2.9% of each transaction plus 30 cents per transaction, while basic sellers pay 5% of each transaction plus 30 cent per transaction. Buyers are not charged to use it.

There are about 20,000 sellers using it, including some big names like Adidas, Green Day, and Tim McGraw.

Chirpify has some competition. Earlier this year, Twitter partnered with American Express to allow users to make purchases on Twitter with an American Express card, but it’s not quite the same because it requires buyers to approve their purchase with a confirmation e-mail.

Chirpify seems to be best suited for products without variables–so that means sellers must tweet products one color and one size at a time. However, I see it as having loads of potential, particularly for artists, musicians, and nonprofits. ____________________________________________________________

Sources: Chirpify (crunchbase.com)

Portland Startup Chirpify (oregonlive.com)

Getting Started with Chirpify (digital-acumen.com)

Does AmEx’s Deal to Sell on Twitter Eat Chirpify’s Worm (socialtimes.com)