TikTok Shopping: Is It Time To Get Serious About Social Shopping?

John W Hayes
3 min readFeb 28, 2023

If your target market is the lucrative Gen Z demographic (18 to 25-year-old shoppers), TikTok Shopping should be high on your list of priorities for eCommerce channels to explore right now. But how seriously should you take the social shopping opportunity, and what are the challenges and opportunities of this relatively new sales channel?

TikTok vs. Meta (Facebook/Instagram/WhatsApp)

Despite being a newcomer to the social scene, TikTok is giving more established social brands a run for their money.

According to a recent survey, social media users are now making ten purchases a year on TikTok, compared to nine on Meta channels, including Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. This figure increases dramatically when you look at Gen Z shoppers who, on average, buy upwards of 19 items per year on TikTok compared to 18 on Instagram and 15 on Facebook.

TikTok Owns Influencer Marketing

Much of TikTok’s eCommerce success is down to how it has harnessed the incredible power of the online influencer. Stealing the thunder of competitive channels like YouTube and Instagram, TikTok has successfully blurred the line between social media and more traditional television shopping channels. As such…

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John W Hayes

Marketing Strategist, Author of #BecomingTHEExpert, Content Marketing Trainer, and Cyclist. Check out my author profile: https://amzn.to/2OO5DR5