Twitter is looking at ways of selling products directly from its social network, as the firm explores new revenue streams from social shopping to compete with Facebook, according to a news report.
Technology blog Re/Code posted a screen shot of what this new service could look like, integrated into the site’s familiar baby blue interface.
The publication claimed it found the image posted on e-commerce site Fancy.com, which is apparently working on a partnership with Twitter.
In the screenshot, which is no longer able to be viewed, certain tweets are tagged ” Twitter Commerce” and, when expanded, show a green “Buy with Fancy” button.
The buyer can then enter their payment and shipping information on another screen, all without leaving the Twitter app or site.
It was not clear what fees or commissions Twitter would charge for products sold within its social network. Nor was it clear whether Fancy.com was the only site with which Twitter was apparently considering a partnership.
Facebook attempted a similar move in September 2012, when it launched the Gifts spin-off that allowed users to buy physical goods from the site.
Twitter’s push into social shopping , which builds on last year’s “pay by tweet” experiments in partnership with American Express, comes ahead of its first set of results as a public company on Wednesday.
According to analysts’ predictions, Twitter’s losses in 2013 more than doubled to $140.9m (£85.7m), with a $14.82m loss in the last three months of the year.
But revenues are forecast to have increased at a faster rate, rising from $316.9m in 2012 to $640m last year.
More than a third of Twitter’s revenue is estimated to have come in the final quarter of the year.
Twitter’s widening losses will stoke fresh concerns from analysts, who warned that the technology stock was overvalued when it floated in New York for $14.2bn last November, despite never having made a profit.
Since the flotation, the company’s value has more than doubled to $35.8bn.