Instagram is hot right now, especially for online stores. That’s the message Bigcommerce sent during its September Town Hall. Instagram has quickly become the perfect engine for building interest in products and brands. The ability to sell through the social platform, however, has been a long time coming.

Instagram Product Tags for BigCommerce

Announced to be coming soon (no actual timeline yet) is the ability for BigCommerce users to tag products from their catalogs using the Instagram app. Instagram has been testing this feature for some time now so this is very welcome news to BigCommerce store owners.

Tags will include the product name and price. Pressing the tag brings Instagram users to a product description page within Instagram. Pressing the ‘Shop Now’ button then takes users to the product page on the business’ website. People that aren’t completely interested in the product don’t have to leave Instagram to learn more, while people that are interested in making a purchase can do so in just a few presses.

Some of the prerequisites that BigCommerce outlined for this feature are the following:

• Stores must have an Instagram business profile that is linked to a Facebook account.
• The same Facebook account must be linked to BigCommerce.
• A product catalog must be approved by Facebook.
• Store currency must be USD (U.S. Dollars).

With everything set up correctly and working properly, tags will be created within the Instagram app. Awesome!

Draft Orders in BigCommerce

It’s hard to believe but the usual online checkout process isn’t ideal for everyone. Some customers still prefer to conduct business over the phone, via email, or by other means. BigCommerce has created a draft order feature that is available now. Store owners can create and save a shopping cart with a unique URL. Customers can then use this URL to complete a secure transaction. Follow this link for more information about BigCommerce draft orders.

Dimensional SKU Level Shipping

Help customers know more about what is going to be shipped to them. Another valuable feature available now globally is dimensional SKU level shipping. Stores can add information to each SKU about a product’s weight and dimensions.

Amazon Product Listing Requirements

Available next month is the ability to map products to Amazon’s shopping categories. Doing this will make selling on Amazon a whole lot easier. Each category has its own set of required listing details and this feature cuts down the work of making sure your product meets those requirements.

PayPal Credit

This is something BigCommerce teased in August’s Town Hall. PayPal Credit offers a financing option to customers. Store get paid upfront while customers pay in installments. Installment plans like this have been shown to increase average order value. The feature also comes with advanced fraud protection and is available with BigCommerce’s optimized one-page checkout. And a helpful note about the one-page checkout: Stores that use 3rd-party funnel tracking like Google Analytics need to update the URL for the one-page checkout. BigCommerce has said that changing the URL from finishorder.php to /checkout/order-confirmation before October 8th won’t see any disruption in tracking. Go make that change now!

BigCommerce keeps improving its interface each month and the changes are not only exciting, but very welcome. We’re excited to see what will be coming in October!

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