Paloma is a Meta-approved developer application, and has been since 2017. (Fun fact: Our Founder & CEO spoke at the Meta Developer conference in 2021!)
When setting up Paloma, you'll be taken through an Instagram authorization form to approve our app to work with your page. Once connected, Paloma uses Meta's Messaging APIs to look for claims in your page's Comments, Story Replies, and DMs, and send corresponding claim confirmations, checkout links, payment reminders, order confirmations, and tracking updates.
Paloma's inventory system is built to work best for sellers with high volumes of unique items – we've even made it so you don't have to pre-list inventory at all!
If you choose to pre-list your inventory, all you need to share is the item's title and price. The app will generate a corresponding code that customers can use to claim or bid with on any Live, Story, Grid, or DM sale.
If you'd rather skip listing inventory, you can instead tag customers in comments or DMs to both create and cart an item instantly. To do so, you would enter the information – "@customerhandle item title $price" – as a comment in your own Live or Feed Post, or as a DM to the customer. See a demo →
To have Paloma track claims and assign a winner, you can start by pre-listing the items in Paloma with our Bulk upload form. This form will take Title and Price, and generate a unique code for each item.
Once the items are created, customers can claim by entering "Claim CODE" in a comment on a Live or Feed Post, reply to a Story, or DM. For example "CLAIM AB20".
The first customer to enter the claim code will win the item, receiving a confirmation in their DMs, and link to checkout.
You'll be able to announce the winners by monitoring your Claim page in Paloma, which shows exactly who wins each item (more reliably than your comment feed).
Prefer your own claim style? Skip listing the items before your sale, and instead use our Tagged Listings to create and cart items once you know who the winner is. To do so, you would enter the information – "@customerhandle item title $price" – as a comment in your own Live or Feed Post, or as a DM to the customer. See a demo →
To have Paloma run a timed auction, track bids, and assign a winner, you can start by pre-listing the items in Paloma with our Single upload form. This form will take Title, Starting Price, BIN Price, and Timer.
In a Live Sale, you can start each item's auction one by one. Once an auction is started, customers can bid on an item by commenting "Bid AMOUNT", for example "Bid 20". You'll be able to see all the bids, and the countdown. When the time is up, the winner will be highlighted for you to review and release the claim. See how it works →
In a Story or Feed Sale, you can run multiple auctions at once, and even schedule them in advance. Once an auction is started, customers can bid on an item by commenting "Bid CODE AMOUNT", for example "Bid AB 20". You'll be able to see all the bids, and the countdown. When the time is up, the winner will be highlighted for you to review and release the claim. See how it works →
Prefer your own bidding style? Skip listing the items before your sale, and instead use our Tagged Listings to create and cart items once you know who the winner is. To do so, you would enter the information – "@customerhandle item title $price" – as a comment in your own Live or Feed Post, or as a DM to the customer. See a demo →
Paloma gets the comments and messages on your page from Instagram in realtime, down to the nanosecond. If a customer makes a claim request, and the item has quantity available when it comes in, they’ll win the claim. If a customer makes a bid request, and it's at least $1 higher than the previous bid request, the bid will be accepted.
Paloma’s app includes a real-time Claim feed where you can monitor the claim wins, including any pre-listed items and any tagged listings. This is more accurate than the comments you'll see in your Instagram Live, which can come in different orders and sometimes missing comments altogether.
We recommend placing a device like a laptop or tablet near your sales table so you can monitor the feed while you run your live, and announce the winners.
To prevent unapproved putbacks, customers don’t have the option to remove Claim items from their carts – only sellers are able to remove Claim items from a customer’s cart in Paloma.
If you have an issue with a customer not paying for claims, you do have the option to block them from making future claims.
Yes! Customers can be blocked from claiming by adding their handles to the Block list in your Paloma Settings. Blocked customers can comment on your Lives and DM your page, but they won’t win any claims.
Nope! You do not need a website, Instagram Shop, or any other commerce or marketplace platform to use Paloma.
Paloma is an own ecommerce platform on it's own, that provides an entire shopping experience in Instagram. You'll get all the inventory, cart and order management, and detailed business reporting to run your business.
Paloma partners with Stripe to take payments, including: All major credit cards, Applepay, Google pay, Cash app, and payment plans including Affirm, Afterpay, and Klarna.
If you collect taxes for your business, you can set the states you’d like to collect taxes in in your Paloma Settings. Paloma will apply the applicable state and local tax rate based on the customer’s zip code, with tax rates provided by TaxJar.
Shipping in Paloma can be done in a few ways:
Set a flat shipping rate, which gets applied to every order
Set rules to add additional amounts based on how many items are in the cart
Set a free shipping minimum that makes shipping free at a specific order value
Set added shipping rates on specific items (these get summed up at checkout)
Set a flat shipping rate on specific customers
Customize the shipping rate on any customer's open cart
Invoice shipping separately, after the customer has paid for their order
Pick the methods right for you, or mix and match!
Paloma offers in-app lable creation, powered by Shippo. Once a label is created, Paloma will mark the order as fulfilled, and send the customer a tracking update via Email and DM.
If you prefer a different label provider, like Pirate Ship, you can download a CSV file from Paloma - Orders on a desktop. This file can be uploaded directly to the lable provider. Once you have tracking information, make sure to add that to the Order in Paloma – this will mark the order as fulfilled, and send the customer a tracking update via Email and DM.
Paloma has partnered with trusted payment processor, Stripe, to take payments at checkout. When setting up Paloma, you'll be able to connect the bank account you'd like to receive payouts to.
When a customer pays for an order, you'll receive the payout within 2 business days.
Note: New Stripe accounts will have an initial 7 day waiting period for the first payout. This waiting period will begin when the first transaction is initiated, so that Stripe can verify the account. Learn more →
We’d love to have you! When you sign up for Paloma you’ll be walked through:
Connecting to your Instagram page
Getting setup to take payments (with our partner, Stripe)
Setting your store settings like fulfillment, shipping, and taxes
That’s it! You’ll be ready to start selling in minutes.
Yes! Any browseable items in Paloma are displayed alongside the customer's cart when they say "Checkout", so you can surface more inventory and increase your order values.
