Nathan Lam is the Product Marketing Lead at Facebook. Nathan leads a team of PMMs that focus on seller and partner marketing across Facebook Marketplace, Instagram Shopping, Facebook Jobs, and Events on Facebook.
What major changes have you seen across the eCommerce/marketplace landscape in the last few years?
For hundreds of years, shopping and buying was a relationship initiated by a person’s need and fulfilled by a shopkeeper’s expertise. It wasn’t just a conversation, it was a connection. Today marketplaces are looking to revitalize this concept by creating experiences that allow businesses to recreate that organic connection. As such, discovery continues to be a critical part of that shopping journey, which is why Facebook and Instagram invested in a platform where people can discover new brands, products, and services. While these tools and features provide customers with the ability to take action throughout their shopping journey, it’s also giving businesses the ability to reach customers where they are already shopping.
What advice do you have for brands when it comes to Facebook Marketplace?
When we first created Groups, we learned that many were using it to buy and sell even though Groups wasn’t designed for that purpose. Marketplace was created to make that experience better, which is why more than 1 in 3 people on Facebook in the US use Marketplace each month, as a convenient destination to discover, buy and sell items. People can find what they’re looking for by filtering their results by location, category and price. For businesses who are looking to reach buyers where they already are while maintaining minimal overhead, Marketplace is a perfect channel to leverage – especially since it allows you to access our entire suite of products.
Today our commerce stack offers the backend technology that is vital to powering our eCommerce platform. It provides a unified catalog, order management system, payments system, and reporting tools. While our commerce stack powers end to end shopping experiences across Instagram and Marketplace today, our vision is that in the near future we’ll power end to end experiences across shopping surfaces across the family of apps.
What purchase of $100 or less has most positively impacted your life in the last six months (or in recent memory)? Specifics like brand and model, where you found it, etc.
Fitness has always played a big part in my life, but I’m also a foodie at heart. For me, the most significant purchase I’ve made in the last 6 months would have to be my Dash Mini Waffle Maker and a box of Protein Packed Kodiak Cake Mix. If you’re like me and you want a healthy alternative to your typical waffles or pancakes without sacrificing the taste – Kodiak Cakes will blow your mind. You can find the mini waffle maker at your local store for roughly $10 and the pancake/ waffle mix for roughly $5 a box.
What is one of the best or most worthwhile investments you’ve ever made? (Could be an investment of money, time, energy, etc.)
The best or most worthwhile investment that I’ve ever made will always be the people that I choose to surround myself with. As you get older, you tend to meet less and less people and it’s the core group of individuals that were there for you since day 1 that will always hold you down.
Thanks Nathan! Make sure to sign up for our upcoming webinar “How to Reach More Customers on Facebook Marketplace” co-hosted by Nathan Lam and Feedonomics.
Brian Roizen is the Cofounder and Chief Architect of Feedonomics, a full-service feed optimization platform that optimizes product data for hundreds of channels. He has been featured on numerous podcasts and eCommerce webinars, and regularly contributes to Search Engine Land and other industry-leading blogs. Brian graduated summa cum laude from UCLA with both a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering.
