Influencers have found a new stage for their brand agreements and product promotion. TikTok, ByteDance's popular social network, is marking a major milestone by launching its e-commerce platform in the United States. With this novelty, the company seeks to capitalize on the enormous popularity of the application and convert its millions of viewers into active consumers, in addition to seeking to compete with e-commerce giants such as Amazon.
In its recent announcement through a press release, the platform presented the 'TikTok Store', a space that offers new possibilities and functions for users, content creators and companies. While TikTok has achieved great success with promoting products through hashtags like
TikTok's ambition goes beyond social media; seeks to compete with e-commerce giants like Amazon. Aiming to sell $20 billion worth of products this year, TikTok Shop is positioning itself as a formidable rival in the world of online commerce. It will offer a wide variety of products, many of which are in the style of AliExpress, the popular Chinese online shopping platform. That is, consumer goods that are frequently of low quality but very cheap.
Nico Le Bourgeois, a TikTok executive, shared his excitement in an interview with The New York Times, emphasizing his aggressive approach to transforming the industry. "We have a very aggressive plan to make waves in the industry and make sure people understand that TikTok is a place to shop," he said. In addition, he anticipated that the platform will be highly active during key events in e-commerce such as Black Friday or Cyber Monday. On these designated dates Le Bourgeois explained that they will offer additional traffic, free shipping and special offers.
As the social network explains in the statement, "TikTok Shop will now bring videos of shoppable products and 'live' broadcasts directly to 'For you' feeds nationwide, and will provide brands, "give merchants and creators the tools to sell directly through in-app shoppable content."
In the launch statement they added that this novelty will allow brands and content creators to "connect with highly engaged customers based on their interests" and, thus, offer a perfect shopping experience.
The social network has created simple tools to help disseminate companies' products:
The initiative also presents challenges in terms of product security and authenticity, as many of the products displayed on the platform are of Chinese origin. And it is precisely this feature that has raised concerns about user data privacy and government regulation. However, TikTok is taking steps to ensure the authenticity of products and the security of user data.
As the “Buy Tab” feature is gradually rolled out, currently available to 40% of TikTok users, it is expected to be available to all users in early October.
