New Instagram Chief Reveals Plans for Online Retailing
Adam Mosseri lays out vision of joining up merchants, shoppers and influencers
By Hannah Murphy
Adam Mosseri, the head of Instagram, has laid out his long-term vision to ramp up retail and tap the desire of the photo app’s 1bn users to indulge in “window-shopping”.
In his first interview about Instagram’s business strategy since taking over last October, the 36-year-old former Facebook executive said he was aiming to “connect the dots thoughtfully” between shoppers, sellers and the app’s huge number of “influencers”.
He said that by introducing functions such as “native checkout”, where shoppers can buy goods on Instagram without leaving the app, and “shopping bags”, where they can hold items in a cart, “we can unlock a lot of value from everyone involved”.
Instagram has only recently started to test ways of allowing users to buy goods directly on its platform, after seeing demand from users, brands and popular influencers, who have large followings on the site.
Some balked when Facebook paid $1bn for a 12-person lossmaking and revenue-free Instagram in 2012, but the app has proven a huge hit among younger users and could now be worth $158bn, according to analysts at…
