If you ask someone what their favorite feature is on TikTok, they will most certainly say the For You page. A close second could likely be the TikTok Shop. And that’s because, so far, it seems like the app has mastered social shopping. It gives room for Creators to sell their creations, and for a ton of products manufactured in China to make their way to our homes for prices no-one outside of TikTok could match. Even with upcoming tariffs on China, these deals will remain unbeatable.
But does that mean that social shopping is actually the future?
The short answer would be an emphatic NO.
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TikTok is likely the exception, not the rule. Its link with Creators makes it a special place to find unique products. Its link with China, and easy platform for the cheap stuff that’s all manufactured there. And even so, this might change at the speed of light if TikTok cannot reach a deal by April 4th.
But perhaps the biggest example of why social shopping is not, yet, the future of commerce, comes from the largest ever e-commerce platform: Amazon.
“Inspire” – Amazon’s TikTok-style feed for social shopping – was killed last month. And few were surprised. In the eyes of advertisers, Inspire just never gained any real interest.
“It never really felt like it had enough traction, in terms of scale, to invest more than an initial test for many brands,” said Joe O’Connor, senior director of innovation and growth at Tinuiti. O’Connor noted that his team didn’t see much adoption from their clients, so they weren’t shocked that Amazon sunsetted it.
So what went wrong?
“Amazon’s foundation isn’t wired for the impromptu, social serendipity that characterizes platforms made for scrolling and discovery,” said Michelle Nguyen, marketing manager at UpPromote. “Which is why Amazon’s Inspire feed ultimately failed — it was a mismatched fit from the beginning.”
Amazon, the biggest e-commerce platform on Earth, was not built to handle social commerce. Read that again, the biggest e-commerce platform was not built for social commerce. Crazy.
And on top of that, Amazon could not attract enough of the influencers that make other platforms – such as TikTok – viable for social commerce. Amazing did not have the “social fabric” that makes social commerce work.
Amazon isn’t the only e-com retailer to struggle with social commerce either. Which begs for the question: is social commerce a thing or is really just for TikTok?