TikTok Shop: The Future of Social Media Commerce

Essentially, TikTok Shop is a marketplace section of the popular social media app that allows companies to advertise their products online and is a place where customers can purchase those products directly.

There are other marketplaces on social media websites (notably Facebook), but this TikTok feature is relatively new for the app that used to be solely about trending content via video uploads.

Companies have been exploiting the benefits of influencer marketing on TikTok for a while, where they either gift goods to the influencer for exposure or financially remunerate them to actively promote brands. 

Looking for more engagement from your online presence? Contact the team at Bark Social today to see how they can grow your online profiles.

Should companies jump on the bandwagon?

When used right, TikTok Shop can be an extremely fruitful way of broadening your audience and increasing sales. 

Having an approach that is suited to this social media platform is crucial. A one-size-fits-all approach to advertising, like running the same advert on TV as you would on TikTok, is unlikely to work. This is because TikTok viewers tend to prefer authenticity, or at least the appearance of authenticity, from the videos they watch. It’s obvious and more accepted that this isn’t the case for TV.

A criticism of the feature is how simple it is to create a merchant profile, due to fairly relaxed verification. Unfortunately, this has sparked fake accounts to pop up and potentially misrepresent an item or simply scam somebody out of money.

As the largest demographic of TikTok users is young, scamming is a cause for concern and might drive young users away from purchasing on the feature until verification has become stricter. However, reputable brands are usually recognisable from their profile layout, number of followers etc.

Yet, because the demographic of people on Facebook and Twitter, for example, is so varied, it can be difficult for companies to assess and narrow down their target audience. This is much easier to do on TikTok as the ratio of young to older users is greater than other mainstream social media apps.

For example, almost half of all TikTok users are between the ages of 18 and 24. This insight allows companies to tailor their products or marketing approach so it’s better suited to this demographic on the TikTok Shop. This means you can more easily predict what will work on the TikTok Shop than a marketplace with more varied demographics.

 The verdict

Position your company appropriately and be cautious about who you align your brand with, and you’ll see that it’s very achievable to deliver profits and success for your company on TikTok Shop. 

Thanks to the platform’s specific demographics, you can more accurately target your audience than might be possible elsewhere. For more assistance and to get started, speak to Bark Social.