After conquering Chinese consumers, TikTok wanted to convert Western Internet users to live shopping, this live video format where an influencer encourages his audience to buy new products.
But the Chinese application was forced to review its plans and stop the expansion of its “TikTok Shop” format on the European continent and in the United States, reveals Financial Times.
After a year of testing in the United Kingdom, the success of this new form of teleshopping is not there.
Some live video did not trigger any sales.
And the influencers who had invested in this project abandoned it in the face of the lack of commitment from their audience.
In the end, the app fell short of its financial goals.
Employees interviewed by the British newspaper say that the Chinese company wanted to generate at least 400,000 books per month in sales.
But the most successful live shopping struggled to reach 5,000 pounds of revenue... On each transaction, the application takes a commission of around 5%.
Read also“Live shopping”: TikTok and Instagram want to establish themselves on this new vein
Faced with these disappointing results, the Chinese group decided to cancel the launches in France, Germany, Spain and Italy of TikTok Shop which were scheduled for the first half of 2022. The same is true for the American launch, which was to take place later in the year.
However, the service remains active in the United Kingdom.
Success in Asia, crisis in the UK
ByteDance, the parent company of the social network, has developed the recipe for live shopping in Asia.
On Douyin, the Chinese twin of TikTok, 10 billion products were sold in 2021, a figure three times higher than in 2020.
Read alsoMajor brands are rushing into “live shopping”
“TikTok Shop” was launched in Indonesia in 2021. More recently, the expansion has reached Thailand, Malaysia and Vietnam.
TikTok claims that
“the act of purchase would be 1.7 times greater via the application compared to other social platforms”.
@tiktokshop_uk
TikTok Shop Summer Sale campaign starts today and we are so ex-ci-ted!
️Search "Summer Sale" on TikTok to discover all the brands and creators participating in the event and enter the giveawayT&Cs Apply: 18+ UK participants only #readyforsummer #summertok #tiktokmademebuyit
original sound -TikTok Shop -TikTok Shop
The official tiktokshop_uk account regularly offers sales and offers, as well as reminders on how to make purchases. Brands like L'Oréal
©
are invited to multiply flash sales and sales.
The British version also suffered from managerial tensions within the London office.
According to another survey by the Financial Times, at least twenty employees have left the team dedicated to e-commerce since the launch of the functionality.
Employees interviewed denounced the Chinese managerial policy, where it is a question of working more than twelve hours a day, from early in the morning until late at night.
A team leader said,
“Relationships are based on fear, not cooperation.
They are not afraid of burnout, because the company is so big that they can directly replace us
”.
Joshua Ma, in charge of the development of the European branch of the shop, was replaced after being questioned for his statements, in particular his skepticism about the importance of maternity leave.