Development of a Social Shopping Marketplace for Handmade Goods

The client seeks to create a platform enabling local handmade goods vendors to increase visibility, promote their products, and facilitate direct customer engagement. Current pain points include limited discoverability, lack of social sharing features, and inefficient purchase processes, hindering growth and customer loyalty.

A mid-sized online marketplace specializing in handmade and local artisan products, aiming to connect small businesses with customers through an engaging social shopping platform.

• Enable users to discover new products and local shops via curated content and advanced filtering.
• Implement social features such as following brands, sharing products, and commenting to foster community engagement.
• Develop seamless, secure purchasing capabilities with multiple payment and delivery options.
• Create real-time communication channels, including chat functionalities between buyers and sellers.
• Provide personalized notifications about shop updates, sales, and trending products.
• Build profile management features for users to customize their social and shopping preferences.

• Content Generation & Discovery Module - curated feeds, trending items, and categories for easy browsing.
• Advanced Search & Filtering Capabilities - category trees, keyword search, and filters to help find specific products.
• Social Follow & Sharing System - follow shops and friends, share products/posts within the app.
• Integrated Chat Functionality - direct messaging between buyers and sellers.
• Push Notifications System - alerts for updates, promotions, and social interactions.
• Secure Payment & Delivery Integration - support multiple payment gateways and logistics providers.
• Order Management Dashboard - track orders, handle returns, and manage purchase history.
• User Profile & Preferences - customize social connections and app settings.

• Payment gateways (e.g., Stripe, PayPal) for secure transactions.
• Logistics and delivery APIs for order fulfillment tracking.
• Content filtering and categorization APIs to support product discovery.
• Notification services for push alerts.

• System should support at least 10,000 active users concurrently.
• Response times for search and filtering should be under 2 seconds.
• Data security must comply with industry standards, including encrypted payment processing.
• High availability architecture to ensure 99.9% uptime.
• Scalable infrastructure to accommodate traffic spikes during sales or promotional events.

By implementing this social shopping platform, the client aims to significantly enhance product discoverability and user engagement, leading to increased sales conversions, higher customer retention, and stronger community building around local artisan products. Target metrics include at least a 30% increase in user activity and a measurable boost in revenue from online sales within the first year of launch.