Twitter took the wraps off its long awaited e-commerce plans today, announcing a test of a Buy button that will enable users to make purchases from within tweets on their iOS and Android devices.
The test is being pushed out to a small percentage of U.S. users, who will be seeing the button on tweets from a select group of Twitter e-commerce partners — Fancy, Gumroad, Musictoday and Stripe.
Users who tap the Buy button will see additional product details and be prompted to enter shipping and payment information. Once that’s been entered and confirmed, order information is sent to the merchant for delivery. Payment and shipping information is encrypted and stored by Twitter so users won’t have to re-enter to make purchases in the future.
Twitter is starting the test with a group of artists, brands and nonprofit organizations, including Eminem, Brad Paisley, Burberry, Demi Lovato, the Nature Conservancy and the Home Depot.
“This is an early step in our building functionality into Twitter to make shopping from mobile devices convenient and easy, hopefully even fun,” Twitter product manager Tarun Jain wrote in a blog post. “Users will get access to offers and merchandise they can’t get anywhere else and can act on them right in the Twitter apps for Android and iOS; sellers will gain a new way to turn the direct relationship they build with their followers into sales.”
Twitter’s e-commerce plans have been leaking into public view for much of the year, most notably in June when Buy buttons, generated by Fancy, appeared for some mobile users, and July when some Android users noticed a “Payments and Shipping” line within their app settings.
Facebook is also testing a feature that allows people to make purchases directly within posts.
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