Twitter Commerce Mock-Up Shows Microblogging's Payments Potential

Thing Daemon Inc.'s Fancy.com, a crowd-curated online marketplace, reportedly provided a peek at what commerce on Twitter could look like in the future.

Based on documentation on a public section of Fancy.com's website, consumers can someday purchase products through Twitter's app or website, according to a report from Re/Code. The images acquired by Re/Code are mockups Fancy.com presented to Twitter, the article says, citing a source close to Twitter.

"This is a Twitter commerce format that would make a lot of sense," says David Schropfer, head of mobile commerce at The Luciano Group. "The front end of the Twitter app screens leaked…seem like the best use of the Twitter app for the purpose of commerce."

Twitter is currently working on a deal with payment processor, Stripe, to help the microblogging site facilitate payments, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Twitter and Fancy.com did not respond to inquiries from PaymentsSource.

Twitter has long been viewed as a ripe platform for new payments products. Several companies have supported payments over Twitter, including Dwolla, American Express Co. and Chirpify. Chirpify has since transformed into an advertising platform for larger brands.

Companies like PikaPay and TipperCoin support payments in bitcoin via Twitter's social stream.

In August, Twitter hired Nathan Hubbard, former president of Ticketmaster, as its first head of commerce. The hire signaled Twitter's approaching move into payments, alongside the other companies facilitating payments on the site as one small part of their overall strategy.

If Twitter is working with Stripe to develop its own payments platform, it would be a good fit, says Schropfer.

"Stripe has a relatively new, scalable, highly flexible payment platform. The mantra is 'built for developers,' which is perfect for Twitter," he says.

"Fancy is a good choice primarily because they are not Amazon," Schropfer says. "Working with a mid-tier online retailer (allegedly) as their first fulfillment partner, Twitter gets to test the infrastructure and consumer adoption in a relatively controlled environment."

Tweets that prompt consumers to purchase would appear as Promoted Tweets, which are Twitter's format for advertising. Users would be prompted to enter their name, address and credit card information, according to the report.

Card information could be stored by the app, according to the images in Re/Code's report, but Schropfer says cloud storage from Stripe is a better way to store consumer's payments credentials, since the security involved in managing credit card data on a mobile handset is costly.