New Details Emerge About Facebook's 'Buy' Button Social media platforms are doubling as ecommerce platforms that deliver instant gratification in the form of instant in-feed purchases.

By Laura Entis

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Social media isn't just for social media anymore. Increasingly, it's doubling as an ecommerce platform – meaning impulse buying has never been so mindlessly easy.

Twitter recently started testing a "Buy" button, which allows users to make purchases directly from the company's mobile app in a seamless couple-of-clicks transaction.

San Francisco-based payments startup Stripe is powering this embedded purchasing feature, and now Recode reports that it is also behind Facebook's "Buy" button, which the social network announced it was testing back in July.

"With this feature, people on desktop or mobile can click the 'Buy' call-to-action button on ads and Page posts to purchase a product directly from a business, without leaving Facebook," the company wrote in a blog post introducing the test run, which is being piloted on desktop and mobile versions of Facebook among several small- and medium-sized businesses nationwide.

Related: Facebook Pilots 'Buy' Button as Twitter Snaps Up Payments Startup CardSpring

As Recode notes, it's possible that Facebook could team up with other payment services in the future (it did just hire David Marcus, the ex-PayPal president), but for now, Stripe and Stripe alone is behind both in-feed purchasing services.

While Facebook and Twitter don't take a percentage of sales transacted over their respective channels (at least, not yet), adding an ecommerce component could attract advertisers who want a more tangible return-on-investment from their social media efforts than "likes" and followers.

No word yet on when either Twitter or Facebook's "Buy" button will transition from pilot test to actual feature, but it seems safe to predict we'll see more developments as the holidays approach.

Related: Facebook's 'Buy' Button Will Change How Brands Sell Online

Laura Entis is a reporter for Fortune.com's Venture section.

Want to be an Entrepreneur Leadership Network contributor? Apply now to join.

Business Ideas

70 Small Business Ideas to Start in 2025

We put together a list of the best, most profitable small business ideas for entrepreneurs to pursue in 2025.

Science & Technology

Generative AI Is Completely Reshaping Education. Here's Why Leaders Can't Afford to Ignore It.

From dorm-room startups to faculty-built chatbots, the future of learning is being rewritten right now — and the institutions that can't keep up are getting left behind.

Business News

Baby Boomers Over 75 Are Getting Richer, Causing a 'Massive' Wealth Divide, According to a New Report

A new paper outlines the three factors driving the generational wealth divide. Here's how some baby boomers keep getting richer.

Buying / Investing in Business

From a $120M Acquisition to a $1.3T Market

Co-ownership is creating big opportunities for entrepreneurs.

Buying / Investing in Business

Big Investors Are Betting on This 'Unlisted' Stock

You can join them as an early-stage investor as this company disrupts a $1.3T market.

Growing a Business

How Building Tech With No Tech Background Taught Me the Most Valuable Skill in Business

The most valuable skill in business today is translation — the power to bridge vision and execution, clarity and complexity, strategy and reality.