'Net Features : chirpify

Chirpify Brings In-Stream Commerce to Facebook

Michael Garrity — Thu, 21 Mar 2013 21:00:00 GMT

For in-stream commerce platform provider Chirpify, it’s time to leave the nest and venture out into the great, big world of social media. That’s right, it’s finally bringing its service to Facebook, so now users can buy products on the world’s largest social network with just one comment.

Until now, Chirpify was only available on Twitter and Instagram, but by inserting its social commerce product into the Facebook news feed, it has brought its capabilities to an average of more than 618 million daily active users. Now, businesses, non-profits and consumers can buy, sell, donate or raise funds from within their news feeds without ever having to leave Facebook.

This could be beneficial, of course, to some of the nearly 80 percent of American businesses that have a presence on the social network, especially if they have an active and engaged collection of “fans” on the website.

To use Chirpify on Facebook, a customer simply has to create a listing in the Chirpify dashboard and include various important details, such as item, dollar amount, shipping time and price, as well as indicating whether the product is digital or physical. Once that’s done, they simply need to click on the “Facebook” button to turn the listing live. From there, the post will show up (and work) in both consumer and brand page news feeds.

Consumers will then buy, donate or enter a giveaway on a posted listing by commenting with either “buy,” “donate” or “gimme,” respectively. From there, Chirpify takes over and makes a payment happen automatically, before sending the consumer a secure download or receipt via email. Chirpify customers can manage all transactions and data from their Chirpify dashboards.

In-Stream Transactions Come to Instagram

Michael Garrity — Tue, 06 Nov 2012 19:21:00 GMT

Social commerce payment system Chirpify is no longer just looking to monetize content on Twitter. In fact, it seems to be banking on the hope that a picture can be worth a thousand dollars, as the company recently expanded its platform to include in-stream commerce from Instagram.

At present, approximately 40 percent of the world’s largest brands have a presence on Instagram, but until now, they never had any way of turning that directly into dollars. Chirpify for Instagram is now the only way for businesses and consumers to either buy, sell, donate or otherwise exchange funds on the social network by turning comments on the site into real-time in-stream transactions.

Sellers (or fundraisers) can create a listing from within the Instagram application; all they have to do is post a photo and make sure that the initial comment reads, “#InstaSale $amount” (with “amount” actually being the price of the item being sold). Once this is done, Chirpify automatically creates a listing, and buyers can make a transaction by simply commenting.

Once a buyer comments, Chirpify will post another comment with purchase instructions. The shopper’s Instagram account will be securely connected to his or her PayPal account, and then they just have to leave a comment that says either “buy” or “donate” (depending on what they’re doing). It’s as easy as that, and then Chirpify will email them a secure download or receipt.

There are already many notable names using Instagram commerce, including Bogs, Fearless Records, Invisible Children, Kat Von D and many others.

Selling on Twitter with Chirpify

Pete Prestipino — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 23:00:00 GMT

Most Web workers will consider Twitter more of a social network than an e-commerce platform, but that’s exactly what Twitter might become as Chirpify launches this week.

Once known as Sell Simply, Chirpify enables merchants (or anyone processing an order really) to conduct direct, person-to-person payments and donations over Twitter through its retail sales platform.

While a relatively new concept to say the least, it’s definitely being hyped as a way to “turn Tweets into transactions.” To determine whether or not that will ultimately be the case on a larger scale you’ll need a crystal ball far more accurate than my own, but a peak into how the platform actually works provides a good look into what you might expect.

Chirpify essentially just integrates with PayPal, but what makes the platform interesting is its ease of use - making a purchase or donation requires the user to only reply to a Tweet with something akin to @username BUY or @username DONATE. No fees are charged to the user for purchasing/donating.

Likely what will give Chirpify a boost, at least initially, is that it offers integration with existing e-commerce storefronts, including Magento (perhaps a nod in exchange for using PayPal as a payment platform. Integrating with popular e-commerce storefronts – the only others listed being Shopify and SAP – is a smart move out of the gate particularly as many likely to use the service aren’t familiar with tasks such as back-end fulfillment, listing and transaction management.

To use Chirpify, merchants simply click the “list on Twitter” button when drafting an item listing for sale in their e-commerce dashboard. Inbound sales information appears as either an email or as part of the retailer’s back-end system, as well as via a DM on Twitter. There are three Chirpify pricing plans (Basic, Pro, and Enterprise).

Chirpify receives a flat 4 percent commission on basic accounts and a flat 4 percent commission for Pro accounts, which start at $49.00 per month. For those merchants interested in going the route of the enterprise-level, Chirpify won’t take any commission at all but expect a hefty monthly or annual fee in exchange.

“Brands, retailers, politicians, celebrities and individuals have spent the past six years using Twitter to build communities and brand affinity, so why not allow them to sell on Twitter directly?” says Chris Teso, founder of Chirpify. “Customers don’t have to leave Twitter to make a purchase or donation. Chirpify removes the frictions of traditional e-commerce check-out processes.”