Facebook is set to weed out bad sellers, pledging to block ads from ecommerce providers that use the social site to advertise and sell products that get a high volume of negative reviews.
The social media site is rolling out a new feature that lets shoppers leave reviews about products and the service around those products that are being sold on the social media site. An vendor that gets too many negative reviews will be warned and then ultimately, if things don’t improve, will get their ads throttled then eventually banned.
Feedback can be left for all aspects of the ecommerce experience, from product quality to shipping costs, customer service, accuracy of ads and shipping time accuracy. Failure to meet satisfy will see poor vendors heaved off the site.
The move marks another step by Facebook into the world of ecommerce and brings it more into line with established marketplace competitors Amazon and eBay, as well as pitting it more squarely against Instagram and Google, all of whom have similar schemes in place.
The move also aims to lift Facebook out of the position of being ‘everyone’s worse enemy’ – seen as a site that people like to use and increasingly shop on, but which fewer people trust or like.
A recent survey from the7stars, a UK-based independent media agency, found thatmore than a third (37%) of UK consumers think Facebook does not care about them.
The Cambridge Analytica data scandal, links election rigging and more have tarnished the social media site at a time when it wants to push on from being an ad platform into being a fully fledged ecommerce marketplace. The inclusion of these pledges will see the site develop a much more policed set of trusted retailers and could make Facebook a formidable force in marketplace selling going forward.
