- Think Z
- Posts
- TikTok Shop and Why You Need to Leverage It
The TL;DR:
Let’s Chat D2C: TikTok Shop is growing rapidly, and your brand needs to start leveraging it ASAP.
What I’m Thinking about this Week: Klaviyo AI launches on January 17th. I dive into what this means for you and why I’m excited about where AI is heading.
The D2Z Podcast: In this week’s episode, I sat down with Jess Cervellon, former VP of Customer Experience at Feastables and now a fractional CMO for various ecommerce businesses. This one was heavy on brand building!
Upcoming Events: DRINKS was selected for a booth in NRF’s Innovation Lab in NYC from 1/13 to 1/17! Let me know if you’re around and want to connect.
Let’s Chat D2C - TikTok Shop
In 2023, an estimated 37 percent of TikTok users in the US made purchases either through links on the app or directly on the platform! This number is only expected to increase in the coming years, with over 40 million TikTok social buyers in 2026, making it critical for brands to think about creating a TikTok presence and enabling it as a sales channel.
One of the many benefits of having your ecommerce storefront on Shopify is the plethora of sales channels you can plug your shop into, including but not limited to TikTok Shop. If you want a more robust integration than the one offered natively by Shopify, you can try AfterShip’s Feed for TikTok Shop.
TikTok’s Affiliate Program
One of the benefits to merchants on TikTok Shop is the TikTok affiliate program, where anyone with a TikTok account can create a piece of content and tag your product, earning a commission for each sale. You can scale an influencer program off of the back of this.
Set this up after your products are approved, and add a bounty for each item that someone sells.
What Types of Products Work?
Consumables crush it on TikTok Shop - think drinks, beauty and skincare, food, etc. When setting up your products, go the extra mile to create individual product descriptions tailored for that platform.
Subscriptions are not live yet with TikTok Shop, so think of unique ways to create bundles that incentivize higher AOVs and include in your messaging post-purchase as well as in your fulfillment package reminders to subscribe.
Combining it with Ads
You’ll be able to skyrocket your conversion rate with TikTok ads if you leverage TikTok Shop and transact directly on the platform versus sending people to a website. It’s like Shop Pay but on steroids.
The 5 Ways Users Can Shop Their Products in TikTok App
Live Shopping on TikTok: Items can be added to the user’s cart during the live stream and they can check out instantly or at the end of the broadcast.
Shoppable Videos: Content with shoppable links that allow users to buy products without leaving the content.
Product Showcase: On your TikTok account, users can tap the shopping tab to access a mini storefront.
Shoppable Ads: Tag products in your content.
Shopping Center Tab (limited markets): By tapping the icon, TikTok users are taken to a one-stop shop to browse products from multiple creators across multiple categories.
What I’m Thinking About This Week - Klaviyo AI
Klaviyo is launching Klaviyo AI on January 17, which includes all of its existing AI capabilities, like predictive analytics and benchmarks, but some exciting new ones as well.
Segments AI
Simply describe the people you want to reach, and Klaviyo will automatically define the segment for you.
Email AI
Describe your goals, and Klaviyo will design an on-brand email section.
Forms Display Optimization
Test multiple versions of your form to find the best display time.
So, Why am I Excited?
I'm super excited about all the updates coming out in AI, specifically with Klaviyo and some of the email and SMS marketing tools like Attentive. Why? Because I still feel like way too much is being done manually. When all these platforms have such a ridiculous amount of data, shouldn't they be able to leverage it, flip the script, and tell us, the marketers, what types of messaging we should send to whom and at what time?
Our current ideation process for flows and campaigns is still our team defining the segmentation, creating hypotheses, testing those hypotheses, rolling them out, and trying to iterate off the results. But there's no way you could tell me we're better suited to do that than the platform with data across hundreds of thousands of merchants to leverage.
For example, you could have someone who just signed up for your newsletter and is a subscriber to 10 other Klaviyo lists. Klaviyo should know, based on their interactions with the other 10 accounts, that this is the type of messaging that that person will respond to the best and at what times to send it. Do they respond best to email, text, or direct mail?
So, there are things like Klaviyo Email AI, where you can describe your goals and then click to create that email for you. That's a step towards a future where we can be more creative and let the platforms figure out the specifics around segmentation, timing, etc., regarding who gets what messaging and when.
I also think this is leading towards a point where you could log into Shopify and tell Shopify, “I want a website that evokes X, Y, and Z emotions and targets this particular demographic.” Then, it'll just go and build a website for you automatically.
I think all of this is long overdue because a lot of the AI stuff that has been coming out recently is very gimmicky, like writing me a subject line or something like that. And how much time is that saving you? What's the value there? It's cool to use and a neat little feature, but it doesn't do a whole lot. In contrast, things like Klaviyo Email AI can make demonstrable changes in your work and allow you to generate greater ROI.
This Week’s The D2Z Podcast
🎧 Listen Now 🎧
In this week’s episode, I sat down with Jess Cervellon, former VP of Customer Experience at Feastables and now a fractional CMO for various ecommerce businesses. This one was heavy on brand building! Specifically, we explored the following:
💰 Transitioning from an employee to being a fractional CMO, leveraging her experience as employee #4 at Feastables
📲 Community-building strategies for brands when they don’t have a celebrity or influencer backing them
😎 Transitioning from ecommerce to retail and the challenges that are associated with it
🚀 AI in content, copywriting, photography, negotiation, voiceovers, and more!
Get my New Book - Think Z!
Rebuy Assistant - BETA
Rebuy Assistant is a conversational search tool that talks with shoppers to learn their preferences and offers personalized product recommendations to keep shoppers engaged throughout their buying journey. There are only 10 Beta spots open, so act fast if you want to be included potentially!
Gorgias Voice
Voice Call Events
Monitor the progress of each voice call with comprehensive event logs where you can see who answered, who declined, and any missed calls all with timestamps.
Upcoming Events
DRINKS was selected for a booth in NRF’s Innovation Lab in NYC from 1/13 to 1/17! Let me know if you’re around and want to connect. I’ll also be heading out to the following:
WSWA: Jan 29 - Feb 1 in Vegas
Vinexpo Paris: Feb 12 - Feb 14 in Paris
ShopTalk: Mar 17 - Mar 20 in Vegas
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