Who says TikTok is just for entertaining clips and internet trends?
The mobile platform is also becoming a powerful tool where merchants can sell their products successfully.
This was what some executives of the short-form video app said during the TikTok Shoppertainment Summit 2023 held in Jakarta, Indonesia on July 5, Wednesday.
The platform has a monthly user base of over 325 million in Southeast Asia alone, making it ideal for sellers who want to drive engagement about their products.
The summit highlighted the concept of “shoppertainment,” which was defined by TikTok as a “content-driven commerce that seeks to entertain and educate.”
Shant Oknayan, TikTok’s head of global business solutions in Asia Pacific, Middle East, Africa and Central Asia, said the concept combines content and community to create highly immersive shopping experiences.
This is made possible by TikTok Shop, an e-commerce solution integrated into the app that enables sellers to showcase and sell products for the community without the need to switch apps.
The feature lets consumers shop without being redirected to partnered shopping apps or websites.
TikTok Shop also allows sellers to discover, communicate, and collaborate with thousands of other TikTok creators through the affiliate program directly accessible on the feature.
Moreover, the feature lets merchants track their performance analytics, including customer reviews and transaction data.
TikTok Shop is the platform’s answer to instances when the mobile app becomes a portal for product discovery or when people make their next purchase decision.
This can be viewed through the hashtags “#TikTokMadeMeBuyIt” or “#TikTokBudol” wherein users are heavily influenced by what they see on the platform.
According to the TikTok Marketing Science Global Retail Path to Purchase Study conducted by Material, users on the mobile app are 1.5 times more likely to go out and buy something they have discovered on the platform compared to other platforms’ users.
The platform itself is also 1.7 times more likely to serve as the source for product discovery than other platforms.
“Consumers today are more open to participating in and reviewing brands and products because of the democratization of creativity on online platforms like TikTok,” Oknayan said at the summit.
“Users are looking for authentic content, inspirational videos, and a seamless shopping experience during the Mega Sales season that lasts from September to the end of the year in Southeast Asia,” he added.
The “Mega Sales” season is a shopping event such as the 9.9 and the 12.12, and the Black Friday Sale, among others.
The platform said that the phenomenon centering on the “#TikTokMadeMeBuyIt” or “#TikTokBudol” concept fuels product discovery since it shows a “word-of-mouth discovery culture that blends community, entertainment, and shopping to create a seamless journey from product discovery to purchase and beyond.”
During this, a single piece of content can quickly go viral and create demand globally.
This can be attested by a study conducted by TikTok and the Boston Consulting Group (BCG).
According to their 2022 Future of Commerce Study, 81% of Asia-Pacific TikTok users say video content has influenced their recent purchases.
The platform said that the hashtag “#TikTokMadeMeBuyIt” has introduced users to a different way of discovering new products on the platform.
A sample of this is Maybelline Vietnam, which logged a 790% sales increase in its Superstay products when it utilized the hashtag.
The mobile app said that the “#TikTokMadeMeBuyIt” hashtag showcases tremendous potential for consumers’ experiential needs that brands can tap into.
Apart from TikTok Shop, merchants can connect with creators and the rest of the TikTok community through the app’s features like the TikTok Creator Marketplace, the TikTok Creative Exchange, Video Shopping Ads and Live Shopping Ads.