Buy buttons are all the rage right now, and the latest to jump on the trend is Salesforce with its Community Cloud.
The company launched Community Cloud roughly a year ago aimed at enabling companies to create their own LinkedIn-like communities, which are connected to their own business processes. With the new announcement, it’s getting an ecommerce element.
“The new e-commerce capabilities enable communities of customers to discover, research, discuss and buy products in a single location while introducing a new sales channel for businesses,” a spokesperson for Salesforce said in an email.
“Now, companies can put a buy button right where their customers are already gathered and engaged,” they added. “Customers including PonoMusic and Avid Technology are already deploying custom e-commerce solutions.”
Essentially, it’s a way for companies to offer a similar experience to what the social giants like Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest are starting to offer, from their own communities.
Salesforce points to numbers from a eMarketer report showing that ecommerce sales are slated to reach $349.1 billion this year.
The company also announced new Lightning components, which are generally available with the current release of Salesforce and are included in all Community Cloud licenses.
“With new e-commerce Lightning Components from Salesforce partners like CloudCraze, Demandware and Bigcommerce, companies will be able to seamlessly incorporate e-commerce into their communities,” the company said in an announcement. “Lightning Components are reusable building blocks that enable companies to quickly add rich new capabilities into their communities without programming. The Winter ‘16 release of Community Builder will enable customers to easily drag and drop Lightning Components into any community.”
AppExchange for Components is also live and available for everyone. Partner components on the AppExchange are priced individually on a per user or per Salesforce instance basis, the company said. New ecommerce Lightning Components from partners are expected to be generally available early next year.
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