New product: Cobuyr brings Social Buying to WhatsApp Groups

Online shopping has become increasingly sophisticated. Yet, one thing has not changed. People still make buying decisions socially. Whether it is a case of wine, a shared gift, or a group holiday, the real decision making happens in conversations with friends, family, and clubs.

The problem is that those conversations happen outside the buying journey. At Cobuyr, we are closing that gap.

We have launched an integrated Social Share and Buying button that lets shoppers instantly create and invite friends into a WhatsApp group, transforming casual sharing into a clear path to communicating and buying together in real time.

At Cobuyr, our vision is to improve how consumers and retailers connect by using technology that works with human behaviour, not against it. Innovation is central to how we do this, with a clear focus on removing friction from commerce and turning social intent into action.

Cobuyr AI goes beyond traditional recommendation engines. It does not just recommend products to individual consumers. It identifies which customers are likely to want to buy together and what makes sense for them to purchase as a group.

For wine merchants and wineries, this capability is powered by a dedicated AI engine built specifically for wine, combining product knowledge, customer preferences and social buying behaviour. The same intelligence now supports social buying experiences across other sectors, including hospitality and rentals, where group decision making and shared payment are fundamental to the purchase journey.

This approach was shaped directly by conversations with our clients and partners and addresses a problem we see repeatedly across social buying categories where demand exists, but friction prevents it from becoming revenue.

Why traditional sharing loses sales

Most share buttons simply copy a link. Someone drops it into a WhatsApp chat, discussion starts, interest builds, and then friction creeps in. Who is actually in. How do we split the cost and decide who gets what. Can we order together. Who checks out. Very often, this friction results in cart abandonment and lost sales.

This is especially common when people want to buy together across family members, friends, or clubs. Traditional e-commerce was not built for this behavior, even though it is completely natural for customers.

From sharing to social buying

The integrated Social Share and Buying button does more than start a conversation. It opens up the opportunity to facilitate true social buying.

By creating a WhatsApp group around a product or experience, sharing becomes a structured buying moment. What starts as a discussion turns into a coordinated group purchase, completed directly on the merchant’s site with group buying with split payments. Conversation, commitment, and checkout are no longer separate steps.

Instead of losing sales when people want to buy together, retailers can actively support and monetize social buying networks and behavior that already exists.

Why WhatsApp matters

WhatsApp is not just popular. It is where commerce is heading.

With more than 3 billion monthly active users worldwide, it is already where people plan trips, organise dinners and coordinate group spending. At the same time, mobile has become the primary way people buy, accounting for nearly 60 percent of global ecommerce sales.

Retailers that engage customers across channels do better. Those that go beyond email and meet customers on mobile consistently see higher engagement, stronger conversion and improved retention. Customers respond when brands show up where they already are.

Cobuyr brings commerce into this existing behaviour. It does not ask customers to change how they communicate. It makes buying together a natural extension of how they already connect. This is why WhatsApp matters.

Business value beyond removing friction

Removing purchasing friction is critical, but it is only part of the value. What makes social buying powerful is the insight it creates and the ability to act on it. When customers initiate group purchases from the site, retailers gain visibility into how buying decisions actually form. Not just what was bought, but how it was bought socially, who initiated the purchase, who joined, and which products naturally trigger group behavior.

Over time, this reveals social buying networks that traditional ecommerce never sees. Friends who regularly buy wine together. Families who plan holidays collaboratively. Clubs and groups that consistently purchase as a unit. These signals are far richer than individual clicks or carts.

Crucially, this insight is actionable. Retailers can identify products that perform best in social contexts, recognize high influence customers, tailor offers for group buyers, and design experiences that encourage collaborative purchasing. In early use cases, group buying consistently drives higher conversion and larger basket sizes.

Preparing retailers for Agentic Shopping

In an era of Agentic Shopping, where software agents increasingly help discover, coordinate, and execute purchases, this capability becomes strategically important. By initiating social buying from the site, the integrated Social Share and Buying button turns informal conversations into visible, structured intent that retailers and future agents can act on.

It creates the conditions for agents to support group decisions, recommend the right moment to buy, and orchestrate execution, including split payments, without relying on manual coordination. This moves retailers beyond individual transactions toward agent enabled, socially driven commerce.

How it works

From a technical perspective, the integrated Social Share and Buying button is lightweight and designed to fit into existing ecommerce journeys. It is added directly to the product or experience page and initiates the creation of a WhatsApp group tied to that item. Behind the scenes, Cobuyr manages group formation, participation, and split payment coordination, allowing multiple buyers to complete a single group purchase without changing the core checkout experience.

Designed to work with modern ecommerce platforms and existing checkout flows, social buying can be enabled quickly without rebuilding the site or disrupting commerce infrastructure.

Social buying in action across wine and holidays

This pattern is especially clear in categories where buying together is already natural.

A customer browsing a holiday company’s website finds a rental or experience that works for a group of friends or family. Instead of copying a link and coordinating offline, they tap the integrated Social Share and Buying button. A WhatsApp group is instantly created around that holiday. The group discusses dates, pricing, and preferences, agrees to move forward, and each person pays their share directly on the site. What would normally stall during offline coordination is completed in a single, continuous flow.

The same happens with wine. A customer discovers a case they want to share with friends or a wine club. Rather than sending a link and waiting for replies, they create a WhatsApp group tied to that case. The group discusses the wines, agrees on quantities, and commits to buying together. Each participant pays their share directly on the site. What might have been delayed or abandoned becomes a confirmed group order, often with higher basket value.

In both cases, social intent stays connected to the transaction, friction is removed, and the retailer gains insight into how and why the purchase happened.

A small product with outsized impact

At first glance, this may look like a small product addition. In reality, it opens up a much bigger opportunity. By connecting social behavior, group buying, split payments, and actionable insight, a single button changes how commerce works in categories where people naturally buy together. It surfaces demand that already exists, reveals social buying networks that were previously invisible, and lays the foundation for more intelligent, agent assisted commerce over time.

Small surface area. Significant strategic impact.

A must have capability, not a nice to have feature

Social buying is already happening. The only question is whether it happens with you or without you because every time customers leave your site to coordinate a group purchase, discuss a holiday, or split the cost of wine, there is a risk the sale slows down or disappears entirely. In categories where buying together is natural, that risk is no longer acceptable.

Cobuyr’s integrated Social Share and Buying button makes social buying a first class capability on your site. It is simple to add, works with behavior customers already have, and unlocks purchases that traditional e-commerce flows struggle to convert.

Group buying with split payments is quickly moving from innovation to table stakes. In a world of social and agent assisted commerce, customers will expect to buy together as easily as they chat.

So, don’t just let people share products. Make buying together effortless. Do that, and your customers become your most effective acquisition channel, driving growth, loyalty and retention at a fraction of the cost.