Telah Resmi, Tiktok Shop Tawarkan Kemudahan Baru Belanja Online

The social video platform Tiktok has finally officially diversified into social commerce through a new category called Tiktok Shopping. This category, which offers a series of online buying and selling features, has previously been tested in various countries since one and a half years ago and can now be used by all users, including in Indonesia.

The inauguration was held at the inaugural Tiktok World Marketing event which was held on September 29. To quote the company, “Tiktok Shopping is a suite of solutions, features and tools that enable business owners to scale their success through TikTok.” The series also has partnerships with other global e-commerce platforms such as Equis, PrestoShop Wix, and Shopify.

Tiktok Shopping allows business owners to link product links, make sales via live broadcasts, display links to products being sold and target them to potential targeted buyers directly in the Tiktok application. In this way, potential buyers who want more information can directly visit the product page or make a purchase directly during the live broadcast. A feature called Collection Ads also allows business owners to place products via swipe-able cards into in-feed videos, or place them dynamically via the showcase ads method.

The inauguration of the new TikTok Shopping category emphasizes TikTok's major shift towards the online retail business. In the last year and a half of testing, TikTok has only done this through individual partnerships with brands like Levi Strauss & Co., Walmart Inc., and a few select merchants in Europe. Now, anyone can do it.

“We fully integrated both parties — merchants and users — and gave them a seamless shopping experience on TikTok,” said Ray Cao, TikTok's managing director and head of global product strategy and operations. “Tiktok Shopping can now be a completely safe place to shop. People can actually see what they are actually purchasing and also make payments directly in the app.”

Cao then added that users or business owners can also choose the transaction method they prefer; directly and automatically within the Tiktok application (close loop) or do it outside the application.

“We also offer two points of integration: one directly on TikTok, or one outside of TikTok. And we will also provide other flexibility, namely carrying out transactions on the business owner's own website."

Loved especially by Gen Z consumers, Tiktok has a very active user base of more than one billion people. Its users interact closely with content creators, and Tiktok has studied as much as possible the dynamics of their interactions to maximize Tiktok Shopping output. On the other hand, the success of Douyin, the social commerce giant which is Tiktok's sibling with GMV last year reaching $77.5 billion, is also an advantage in itself. According to Cao, the user base and all the knowledge and experience will be Tiktok's capital in achieving great success in social commerce.

“We have a playbook that we have worked out and implemented in the Southeast Asia region, so we know what we are doing,” Cao continued. “We understand, for example, how to create a successful live stream for business owners or creators. We have experiences that we can share directly with them. In the past we only did this through individual partnerships, now we open it to everyone. Individual partnerships will now take place alongside open partnerships for everyone. "Now we welcome anyone to join," said Cao.

*Extracted from various sources