Facebook is slowly taking out tangible goods from its Gifts program, says an article by Mashable. Instead, the social network will focus on adding more merchants to its Facebook Cards, a reusable gift card that enables users to maintain monetary balances from various retailers (e.g. users could have $10 at Sephora and $25 at Jamba Juice on the same card). This change will benefit both Facebook and users as the social network will be able to reduce delivery and management costs while users will be able to attain exactly what they want. 80% of gifts service users currently use the program to purchase gift cards.

 

This shift will enable Facebook to leverage its enormous network and innovative nature to explore a whole new market: the e-Commerce space. By quickly entering the online retail sector using Facebook Cards, the social network will not only able to shift away from the advertising industry dominated by Google, but also gain traction in a booming field.  With Facebook Cards, Facebook will be able to penetrate the e-Commerce space with less logistics and marketing expenses than e-tailers such as Amazon.

 

Read the whole article at Mashable.