Video: Americans Love to Shop Online. TikTok Is Making It a Live Sport.

“This new flash deal is for two days.” “$11.99!” “Other deals down in the cart.” “You get the bra, the top and the leggings, all for $16.” This is Solaris. She’s 21, and she sells products on TikTok LIVE for a living. “Listen, if my body isn’t representative of yours, there’s someone in those reviews who is. I’m going in for about four hours – 3 to 4 hours – and take an hourlong break, and then I get back on for the remainder of the day. I can pick something up and immediately, just like, Look at this little guy, why don’t you — He’s cute. Don’t you love him?” TikTok launched its in-app shopping feature in the U.S. last year, hoping to replicate the success of its Chinese sister app, Douyin. To do that, it has partnered with third-party agencies like this one, run by Chinese Americans with experience in e-commerce. TikTok offers the agency sample products and negotiates with brands on their behalf. The goal is to train creators to sell products live to a social audience and make the platform a mainstream shopping destination in America. “3, 2, 1. All right, Skye, you claim the orange. I got you, my love.” Streamers go live for several hours each day from this tiny studio in Manhattan, New York City, hawking everything from snacks and clothes to toys and press-on nails. “Please make sure that these are at least in your cart right now, OK? If they’re not in your cart right now, you’re going to have missed out on your chance to get this. It’s hard to explain my job to my friends. Everyone, you know, like, is on TikTok, but my friends don’t know about TikTok LIVE. Until they actually watch me on it, they’re like, But what are you doing?” “Let me show you real quick how you place an order with us, all right?” “There’s only a few single digits left, items for small and medium for this color too. So get it while you can.” These operators have a whole playbook of tactics to drive sales, like celebrating each purchase with a ringing bell — “Right here. That’s another sale. Thank you for purchasing, guys.” and offering limited-time flash deals exclusively for viewers. “Comment the word ‘me’ if you do want us to do another flash sale deal for these. Because I just came in here, I want to be able to give you guys some deals too, OK?” On her biggest day, Maria sold $10,000 worth of jumpsuits after eight marathon hours of livestreaming. But on some days, the haul is just a few hundred dollars. It all depends on who sees the livestream and how often. “Because of that, I’ve learned to really rely on my hourly pay and not rely on my commission too much.” “I get paid $25 an hour plus 2 percent commission. This is definitely like the best-paying job for my set of creative skills that I could get at the moment.” “We have some giveaway starting right now, guys. If you’re just joining, welcome.” TikTok Shop has grown rapidly. The company has reportedly set a goal to reach as much as $17.5 billion in sales by the end of this year. But even that is still peanuts compared to its sister app, Douyin, which has become an e-commerce juggernaut in its own right. It sold over $200 billion worth of goods in China last year. That’s about a fourth of what was sold on Amazon globally in 2023. But TikTok’s major e-commerce push in the U.S. comes at a precarious time. The government passed a law that would force TikTok to be sold or face a ban. “It’s a little scary because it’s, like, I work on TikTok. That’s my job. That’s how I make my full- time money to pay my bills, pay my rent, pay my credit card off. It kind of definitely makes me very uncertain as to, you know, where am I going to go after this.” Though many believe the phenomenon of social e-commerce will still take off here, even if TikTok isn’t around long enough to see it through.