TikTok Will Launch New E-Commerce Features & Tools Including Affiliate Links & Live Stream Shopping
Source: TikTok
TikTok is planning to expand its e-commerce functionalities.
According to The Financial Times , the China-owned short-form video app has plans to empower creators with affiliate links and live streaming shopping features. With affiliate links, creators will be able to share links to products they feature in their videos and earn commissions on purchases, while with live stream shopping, creators can go live and highlight products that viewers can purchase in real-time.
Along with these, brands will have the ability to showcase product catalogs on the app.
Previous In E-Commerce Investments HaVE Mostly Been Experimental
While TikTok has been the craze the last year and change, it's been somewhat slow to roll out robust e-commerce capabilities. It mostly has spent time experimenting and testing e-commerce features on a one-off basis. However, in October, it dived the deepest into e-commerce with the launch of a partnership with Shopify.
Since e-commerce and creator monetization is a central focal point of most social media platforms today, TikTok's plan would capitalize on these emerging trends. It would move the short-form video app beyond a primary source for entertainment to a powerful place for social commerce.
Affiliate links Will Provide Benefits For both Brands & Creators
The addition of an affiliate marketing component is quite notable. The pandemic has caused many brands to invest more in their affiliate marketing efforts or lead brands to launch affiliate programs for the first time. With some brands having smaller budgets for influencer marketing and/or looking to better measure the ROI of their influencer marketing efforts, affiliate programs have become quite appealing and useful.
On the other hand, many creators especially TikTok first creators, are leveraging affiliate links to monetize their content.
Due to both of these, affiliate links will provide benefits to both brands and creators. Brands can easily activate TikTok influencers to create content and share affiliate links to drive conversions, allowing them to see how influencer campaigns impact their business. At the same time, creators can earn money for their ability to create engaging content that drives purchases.
TikTok Will Be Able To Better Compete With Facebook In Social Commerce
Through new-commerce functionalities, TikTok will be able to better compete better with Facebook, which has gone all-in on social commerce. Considering how powerful TikTok already is in product discovery and purchasing despite its current limited capabilities, it’s almost certain that TikTok is the future of social commerce.
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Ultimately, the new integrations would move consumers faster through the purchasing journey, allowing them to take action relatively easily.
