More than half of the global population are  active social media users. People  everywhere are more and more connected  and increasingly have the ability to make  online commercial transactions worldwide. 

While social media platforms have always  provided an environment for buyers and  sellers to interact, a shift is taking place  towards organized commerce on  platforms.

Social commerce means that discovery,  browsing and purchasing can all take place  on one platform without the need to  interact with any external websites or  applications. 

This functionality tends to be newer  platform-by-platform than the longstanding  social marketing ecosystem, where brands  use paid and organic posts on social sites  and apps to drive traffic to their website. 

These ads typically showcase products or  services alongside a call to action to direct  people to their website.