TikTok Shop Tips: 10 Ways to Sell More [+ Real-Life Examples]

From ads to analytics, TikTok offers sellers a long list of features to help drive sales. Let’s take TikTok LIVE as an example. According to TikTok statistics, TikTok users are 1.7 times more likely to watch branded LIVE to buy a product. Moreover, beauty and personal care, with $2.49 billion GMV, are the highest-grossing category on the TikTok Shop marketplace. 

TikTok Shop has emerged as a game-changing platform for small businesses, big brands, and creators. To help you maximize the power of its seamless, in-app shopping experience, here are 10 tips for selling on TikTok Shop. 

1. Optimize product listings

Whether you’re using an eCommerce platform to sell your products online or TikTok Shop, you’ll need product descriptions. When done correctly, it builds trust and improves the overall customer experience. 

Source: tiktok.com

The key elements include: clear product titles, high-quality product photos, and product descriptions. TikTok shares the following best practices for optimizing your product listings:

• When writing your product title, use the title case. You can include standard punctuation marks as needed, but avoid special characters and symbols.
• As for the content of your product title, stick to the essential details, like type of material and color, and avoid promotional or subjective words such as “affordable”, “bestseller”, etc. 
• Product titles should be between 25 and 80 characters. To help you maximize the character count, use digits and abbreviations. It can also improve readability.
• Each product should have at least five, high-quality images. The style should match your branding. If you list on other marketplaces or social media platforms, there should also be a style consistency between TikTok and the other channels. 
• Product descriptions should be a maximum of 500 characters. It should focus on product benefits, features, and unique selling points (USPs) that the target audience will find the most relevant. 
• You can also include commonly searched keywords to improve product visibility. These words can be incorporated into your product title as well as product description, as long as they relate directly to the product. After all, TikTok has evolved from merely being an entertainment source to a search engine and paying attention to TikTik SEO becomes necessary.

Basically, you want your product to pop up on search pages and stand out from similar products. Going forward, everything that you do — an influencer partnership or series of video ads — will depend on how well you’ve created these pages. 

2. Embed product listings into videos

On TikTok, you can embed product listing links into videos. If you’re sharing multiple products in one video, you can also embed more than one link. 

Ensure that you leverage this feature to streamline the shopping experience. A streamlined shopping experience typically means higher conversion rates as users can become buyers without having to hop on to a third-party website.

Embedding links into video can increase engagement and expand the reach for certain products. The platform is well-known for attracting users’ attention within a matter of seconds. Sharing videos with product links can take engagement from browsing to buying. What’s more, TikTok users also love to share content with friends and followers. So, if they’re not interested in buying, one of their friends might. 

3. Create Video Shopping Ads

All TikTok Shops have access to video shopping ads. To help maximize sales, TikTok suggests that you select Product Sales as the objective and TikTok Shop as the Product Source. 

It’s best to create ads for various products. While you’ll want to prioritize ads for top-selling products, you also want to advertise new products or those that are lagging behind in sales. This way, you can generate exposure for these items that need it more and, at the same time, gather data about their market potential. 

Also, consider the price point. You want to create ads for cheaper as well as more expensive products.  

As for the number of ad creatives, TikTok suggests creating between three and five ad creatives per ad group at least. Then, try to add a new creative to the ad group once a week. 

Mel Blue, CEO of Unicorn Cosmetics, highlights that these ads are very effective at driving brand awareness and platform growth. As TikTok suggests, her brand has created various creative variations for video shopping ads, ensuring that each one includes native features like text overlay and voice overs. The result  — conversion rate increased by nearly 20%, while the cost per acquisition (CPA) decreased by basically the same percentage. 

@unicorncosmetics shop our strip lashes in the bundles linked!! put any 3 styles in your basket to activate a 50% dicount!!?✨ #tiktokmademebuyit #unicorncosmetics #striplashes #lashes #fluffylashes ♬ original sound - Typa_Music?

4. Prioritize authenticity and creativity

Compared to other social media platforms, authenticity is even more important on TikTok. Guard against coming across as too salesy. 

Not only should you use an authentic brand voice, but your content format should also align with what trends on TikTok. Nom Nom Kids recommends that sellers stay up to date with the trends. It has helped their brand to drive more traffic towards their content. Within eight months after joining TikTok shop, they’ve gained 15,000 more followers. You can, for example, incorporate TikTok Sounds, pop culture references, transitions, or dance moves into your content. 

Source: seller-uk.tiktok.com

Another way to show up authentically is to share user-generated content. Aside from being more real, it also encourages potential customers to interact with products. 

It might sound counterintuitive, but the way that you create an authentic brand on TikTok is by avoiding branded content. On TikTok, you're a content creator first, then a brand. 

Ideas of how you can stay real include:

• Creating unboxing videos that highlight product features
• Recording a product demonstration to explain how your product works
• Posting a series of before and after videos showing what customers can expect 
• Sharing your brand and products’ backstories

@nomnomkids Unbox an order with one of my customers. Pure joy to watch! #CapCut #unboxing #tiktokshoporder #tiktokshop #orderpacking #happykids #happycustomer #shopping #parenting #reusablefoodpouches #nomnomkids ♬ Funk It Up - Official Sound Studio

5. Take up a challenge (or start your own)

Adding to the previous point, it’s key that you create native content. It should align the look and feel of the platform. 

Another way to do that is to create or participate in a challenge. By participating in one, you can leverage the popularity and gain more views and followers without having to do too much. 

Alternatively, you can start one from scratch. As you won’t have a trending challenge to latch onto, you’ll need to create your own wave. Offering a few of your best-selling products as a prize can be a good incentive to break the ice. Even if you won’t be starting a challenge, running competitions from time to time is a great strategy for generating interest and traffic. 

What’s important, though, is that your offering fits into the context of the challenge. You can only jump on top of a challenge if you can create a logical link. 

Aside from all the exposure, participating in trending TikTok challenges lets you engage with the wider TikTok community. The platform is all about engagement. 

@yanntufanes Rejoins le challenge ? #PlayWithPringles #sponsorisé ♬ Don't Stop Don't Stop - Paul Leary, Nait Masuku

6. Work With TikTok Influencers

According to Influencer Marketing Hub’s The State of Influencer Marketing 2024: Benchmark Report that surveyed thousands of marketers and brands, TikTok is the most popular channel for influencer marketing and by quite a stretch. Nearly 70% of brands use it, of which about 80% track sales from their influencer marketing campaigns. 

That said, when using influencer marketing to drive sales, don’t let the number of sales be the be-all and the end-all. Less than a quarter of brands use sales to measure the success of influencer marketing. Views, reach, and impressions are far more commonly used, with more than half using it as the measuring stick. 

To ensure you reach the right crowd, partner with an influencer in your niche who knows the nuances of TikTok. Niche is more important than follower size. 

Your involvement basically ends after influencer selection. Trust the influencers to create relevant content in their own style that will showcase your products positively. You sent them a free product so that they can share their experience with their network not to buy a positive review. 

Home Lab UK and Latin Honey Shop echo this advice. One of Home Lab UK’s top seller tips is to value your creators. They give their affiliates total freedom over content creation. To date, they’ve partnered with 300 creators. In fact, over 90% of their monthly sales are generated via the affiliate program. 

7. Create a Seller Flash Deal

TikTok offers a number of promotional tools, like Seller Flash Deals to create a limited-time promotion. The longest promotion period that you can set is 72 hours. However, TikTok suggests capping it at 40 hours, which is the typical period. 

It’s ideal for creating urgency among shoppers when selling clearance items or maximizing the potential of trending products. Let the social calendar guide you. If you’re selling stationery, for instance, a Seller Flash Deal perfectly timed just before school starts can generate a great conversion rate.   

That said, this type of limited-time deal can also be a way to give back to your customers. So, even if you have no items you want to sell in a hurry, treat your target audience to flash deals from time to time. 

8. Go live

If you have over 1,000 followers, you also have access to TikTok LIVE which supports real-time interaction. It involves some planning, but like limited-time offers it stirs up a sense of urgency. Plus, you can also share exclusive discounts during your livestream sessions to double the urgency and encourage engagement. 

As Rashee Mittal, marketing manager at Locowise, a social media management and TikTok analytics tool explains, “I think the key to success for a TikTok Shop is building a sense of community and exclusivity around your brand.” She suggests that brands find a way to integrate creative challenges and offer limited-time product drops to foster a loyal following.  

Also, when leveraging live format, try to stick to schedule. This is what MySmile did. 

To help sell its range of teeth whitening and oral care products, it created a new distribution channel on TikTok Shop in addition to Shopify and Amazon. It hosted weekly LIVE events to engage with organic audiences. Then, to market these events, it also leveraged LIVE Shopping Ads. Within 90 days, it generated more than $1 million in gross merchandise value (GMV). Compared to Amazon, the conversion rates MySmile record are higher than Amazon and it has increased its budget to TikTok since. 

You don’t necessarily need to limit it to once per week. For example, Bear Burners went live more than seven times a week. That said, only do it if you can do it consistently. 

Bear Burners used LIVEs to incorporate creative selling techniques and connect directly with customers to share stock updates and tackle customer queries. This hybrid approach has helped them to add 2,500 new followers and generate over £30,000 within the first two months of starting on TikTok Shop. 

9. Interact with buyers across the journey

Once you start selling on TikTok, you’ll also need to pay attention to customer service. To help you in this department, the platform offers buyer message tools in the Seller Center, a chat page, and data like your response rate and the satisfaction score of your buyers. 

The chat tool indicates the number of unread messages. Make it part of your daily routine to monitor this number so that customers receive a quick response. 

Communication becomes even more important once a customer has bought a product. Via the Manage Orders panel, you can track orders and update customers about their order’s status. It’s this level of responsiveness that can drive repeat business.  

Replying to comments from customers is another key activity as it shows engagement. TikTok lets you reply to comments via video, but even a simple one-word reply or an appropriate emoji will let potential customers feel heard. 

These comments can also be turned into social proof. After you’ve replied, you can also share any positive feedback on your own channel to instill trust into potential customers.

To make your own journey as seamless as possible, consider using a third-party fulfillment service. Outsourcing fulfillment allows you to concentrate on creating content, ad campaigns, and customer service. 

You don’t need to look too far. One of TikTok’s useful features for sellers is that it offers fulfillment services. From storing to delivery, Fulfillment by TikTok manages the whole process. 

10. Use analytics to track store performance

In addition to promotional tools and a fulfillment service, the platform also offers built-in analytics tools. Via the Data Compass Overview, you can get an overview of sales and traffic.

TikTok Shop also launched a Shop Performance Score to give sellers insight into their operational health. Using product satisfaction, fulfillment, and customer service, it gives you a score out of five. This score is visible to the public, one more reason to monitor it. 

It’s useful as it highlights which metrics can be improved, along with benchmarks to set realistic goals. Plus, it also identifies which products have impacted that metric. 

Source: newsroom.tiktok.com

Make Your TikTok Shop Successful with These Tips

While it will take time to figure out which type of content does well on TikTok, you’ll probably find that the video that you spent the least amount of time planning and editing will generate the best results. That’s the thing about TikTok. Raw, unfiltered moments work best, even when you’re trying to sell products. 

Yet, you still need to pay attention to trends. It’s finding this sweet spot between creating content that’s on-trend but authentic. 

Whether you’re creating a series of Video Shopping Ads or going live, you need to come across as authentic. It can be challenging, one reason why including an influencer marketing campaign is key. TikTok influencers know what type of content users on this platform gravitate toward.