As Time May Run Out for TikTok, It Dives into Livestream eCommerce

The video-sharing social media platform TikTok has clocked up a keen following among young bloods watching teens become celebrities through lip-syncing songs and body movements that some consider to qualify as dancing.

An estimated 800 million people use TikTok around the world. In the US half of all teenagers have used the app. Yet earlier this month, TikTok was threatened with being banned from the country unless it was bought by an American company like Microsoft or Oracle, which is in talks to acquire the platform.

Despite these darkening clouds hanging over TikTok, it has just released a shoppable livestream function in collaboration with Ntwok, a shopping network that markets to teens and early twentysomethings.

The livestream ecommerce function was showcased yesterday, in which a pop-up page let viewers buy products without leaving the app that were showcased during a limited-edition fashion collection.

All things being equal, the soon-to-be 1 billion users of TikTok represent a huge market for brands and retailers to broaden their ecommerce presence, and provide the chance for getting creative with active and lively ads and product showcases.

As a strategy, livestream ecommerce is another tool to reach customers in times of ongoing lockdowns and social distancing, and is attached to the ongoing surge in ecommerce.

Businesses that have driven a harder online strategy have seen significant benefits as they diversify revenue streams away from in-store sales — for obvious reasons. Instagram has launched its shopping feature called Instagram Shop; meanwhile Facebook Shops makes it easier for smaller companies to sell online.

All form part of a wider digital strategy to meet customers at the edge of the ecommerce landscape, in new digital touchpoints where users hang out, especially younger generations that congregate in online spaces the most, and shop online much more than older generations.

The difficulty of such a strategy is to keep up with all the platforms and manage them well. Fortunately, there are a few ecommerce platforms, such as Salesforce B2C Commerce Cloud, that allow you to manage your entire ecommerce landscape for a centralized space.

PS: UV is one of the world’s leading Salesforce B2C Commerce Cloud experts. Contact us to see how we can work together.