In China, one out of three online purchases is being done through social e-commerce experiences, with live shopping making up the largest share in 2021. The trend is now picking up in Europe as well. The continent’s e-commerce brands are increasingly seeking simple yet highly customisable and scalable SaaS solutions that can deliver high-quality live shopping experiences.
Enter Berlin-based LiSA which is developing a social commerce cloud to include headless solutions to facilitate cross-platform discovery for users as well as an API-based partnership network. The live and social shopping SaaS solution platform has now raised €2.7 million in funding.
The round was led by TechVision Fund (TVF) and backed by the UK-based VC Venrex and angel investor Georgie Smallwood, part of Accel’s first cohort of Scouts and chief product officer at micro-mobility startup Tier.
The German startup, which participated in Brent Hoberman’s Founders Factory accelerator programme in 2019, will accelerate the growth of its social commerce SaaS business and boost frictionless, cross-platform social commerce through its headless solutions and API-based partner ecosystem.
Founded by husband-wife duo Sophie and Philippe Frères, the startup aims to help e-commerce retailers leverage the untapped potential of social discovery. The headless content management system (CMS) allows online retailers or marketplaces to develop their own live and social e-commerce experiences at scale. According to the company, its solutions have helped e-retailers’ reach customer engagement levels of up to 90 per cent, online conversion rates of up to 35 per cent, and organic social sharing rates of up to 14 per cent.
Sophie Frères, LiSA’s founder and CEO, said: “The booming social e-commerce market has reached a level of maturity where it’s increasingly unmanageable for retailers to use up to 20 different little feature plugins. Also, seamless cross-platform experiences are simply expected by users. This funding allows us to address this holistically, by rapidly scaling our headless solutions and social commerce cloud.”
Pascal Bless, TVF investment manager added: “The startup brings e-commerce into the 21st century. The digitisation of shops had an enormous impact. The purchase can now be made quickly, anywhere, and anytime. Social components were increasingly lost. With LiSA, we are entering the next evolution of shopping, where shopping remains digital with all its benefits and where the very much-needed social elements are brought back.”
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