TikTok is venturing into the land of bricks and mortar retail by opening a pop-up shop on London’s Oxford Street in London, in a move designed to showcase the breadth of brands and creators selling on the platform in a real world context.
However, any consumers planning on visiting will be disappointed, as the pop up is not open to the public; instead it will be open to existing and prospective merchants and creators to visit this week, with a particular focus on the tech, home and living and book product categories.
Merchants and creators are hosting live streams from the venue, citing recent which shows 50% of TikTok users have bought something after watching a TikTok Live, and TikTok users are 1.7 times more likely to watch branded Lives to buy products than non-users.
The social media site is keen on pushing its own brand of “community commerce”, a blend of community, entertainment and shopping. TikTok claims that hashtags like #TikTokMadeMeBuyIt have reached over 60 billion views, enabling users to discover the biggest trending products across beauty, fashion, food, tech and more.
Through this pop up shop, merchants and creators will have the opportunity to meet TikTok experts to learn all about the power of social selling and how businesses can tap into the online community and trends like #BookTok and #TechTok.
There will be a range of home and living, electronics and book brands and creators attending the pop up shop and sharing how they tap into the TikTok community to sell on the platform. This includes kitchen appliances brand Sage Studios (@Sage), hair tech brand Cloud Nine (@cloudninehair), drone business DJI (@DJI_uk), and publisher Harper Collins (@harpercollinsuk). The pop up will also feature Lives from creators including Luke ‘@Lopwert’ Cameron (@lopwert) and food creator Lagom Chef (@lagomchef).
TikTok general manager of ecommerce Patrick Nommensen said: “TikTok’s community has created a brand new era of social commerce opportunities, where a single piece of content can quickly go viral and create both demand and opportunity. We’ve seen merchants and creators transform their businesses and their lives in a way that would be impossible on any other platform.
“Our community can now discover and buy everything from a new coffee machine to the latest drone, or their favourite #BookTok best seller, all without leaving the platform. Through this exciting pop up shop on the iconic Oxford Street, we hope to shine a light on the opportunities available for merchants and creators to be discovered and thrive on the platform.”
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