Aaron Conant 0:18

Happy Thursday, everybody. My name is Aaron. I'm the co-founder here at BWG Connect. I spend the majority of my time just talking to brands around the biggest pain points, topics they want to cover, things that are interesting to them or popping up across the digital landscape. When the same topics come up over and over again, we host an event like this. So thanks everybody for joining in couple of housekeeping items. As we get started, we kick this off three to four minutes after the hour, and just so you know, we're gonna wrap up with at least three to four minutes in the in the hour as well. We're gonna give you plenty of time to get on to your next meeting without being late. The other thing was, we wanted to be as educational and informational as possible. So at any point in time, if you have a, if you have a question, drop it in the chat or drop it in the Q and A, whichever is easier, and we'll get to those as real time as we can. The other thing is, thanks for joining. And if you are in the New York area, next Thursday, the 12th of December, we're gonna be doing a full day event in Midtown. Great to see people there. But other than that, let's jump into this topic today. Just Jana and I were, we were in the pre call chit chat there. TikTok has really come up recently, I'd say over the past eight to nine months, it's like a bunch of brands, we're sitting back waiting for somebody to figure out the strategy, other than just going viral. And some of the leaders out there, I think, Blue Wheel, the team over there, leading the way with a lot of brands, and figuring out an actual strategy that works. And so I was following up with them. They're great friends, partner supporters to a ton of brands in the network. And this topic seemed really relevant. So how does this succeed on TikTok Shop? This should be a blast, Jana. I'll kick it over to you if you want to do kind of a background on yourself, a little bit around Blue Wheel, and then we'll jump into the

Jana Weinstein 1:56

heart of it. Sound good? Yeah, for sure. So excited to be here. I actually, I started my career on the brand side. So I always love talking to brands. I worked for years in the fashion industry for different designers, overseeing sales, business, development, merchandising. I pivoted into tech with the pandemic, like I feel, like a lot of us did. And in the fall of 2022 I actually was recruited by bytedance to be one of the first 50 hires working on a little something called TikTok Shop. So I started on November 7 of 2022 and November 10, the very first shop went live. Granted, we were still in alpha back then, so wasn't known to a lot of people. So to see where it is today has been astounding. Obviously, I'm still passionate about it. I was with TikTok Shop for a little over a year, and then I pivoted onto the agency side, where I now build out social commerce for brands, and it's something I'm super passionate about, and so really looking forward to diving in today.

Aaron Conant 2:55

Yeah, it should be a blast. Quick reminder, there's a few more people to join. Drop your questions into the chat or the Q and A as we get going, and we'll get them answers. All right, let's, let's jump into it cool. So

Jana Weinstein 3:05

just like a little bit about Blue Wheel, Blue Wheel is an omni channel agency that focuses on brand strategy and execution across nearly every channel. We like to say, from click to ship when it comes to TikTok, Blue Wheel can support clients across the suite of services, including content creation, organic, social, mass affiliate outreach, influencer partnerships, paid media. And then where I come in, which is all things TikTok Shop. So agenda for today, we are going to debunk some of the myths surrounding TikTok we're going to explain how the TikTok Shop affiliate program works, and then we're going to show you the opportunity of growing your brand through social commerce. Okay, so Myth number one, this is my one of my favorites to debunk, because I'm a millennial myself, so as a millennial who utilizes TikTok daily, it is not only for Gen Z TikTok. Has 1 billion users worldwide. There are 170 million monthly active users in the US alone, and 44% of those users are actually over the age of 34 so when you are on TikTok and you see mom talk or book talk or clean talk. These are all great niches for ages, not just Gen Z, but as a brand. This is where I would focus on the Gen Z opportunity. You'll see or 51% of Gen Z uses TikTok as their primary search engine. And look at that collective spending power, right? And instead of using Google and Amazon, TikTok is actually where Gen Z is searching for new brands and products. That number of users searching TikTok will only increase as both the platform grows and then also as Gen Alpha gains spending power of their own.

Aaron Conant 4:59

Yes. Just super interesting to see numbers put to it, because I think anecdotally, everybody's been feeling that, you know, you have the millennial group that is really they were focused more on Amazon is the star way to start off, little older than millennial. It's Google. Then it goes to amazon as the primary search engine for products. And now this is crazy, yeah. 

Jana Weinstein 5:22

And honestly, it's more tailored, right? You know, when you do a Google search and you have 37 pages of listings to click on with Tiktok, and the way the algorithm works, it is way more curated, which I think is really important, and a way a lot of people like to browse and shop nowadays. Yeah? Myth number two, you need a huge following to succeed. The for you page is actually designed to surface content to individual users rather than a creator or brand's popularity. Therefore, it makes it easier than other platforms for brands to gain visibility without that large pre existing base. The algorithm does prioritize engaging content, and that gives brands with a smaller audience the opportunity to generate sales, but only if their content resonates. I actually like this slide. There's a lot on here, and so I'm going to try to keep it as short as possible. But here are some key ways, if you are not a huge brand with a huge following, to ensure that you can beat the algorithm and position your brand for growth. Posting. Now if you ask Tiktok, they'll tell you to post a million times a day, as many times as you can, which can be intimidating for for brands. But I kind of want to dial it down and say posts can be product based. They can be entertainment. They can be brand inspiration, details about the product. People love bloopers, and they are and can be and should be a lot of the times really short. So the bottom line is, don't get intimidated by posting. It doesn't have to be the most curated, over produced, beautiful content you've ever done. The point of posting is to get the algorithm just to familiarize itself with who you are as a brand. So I think that's super important. Yeah,

Aaron Conant 7:16

really quick. Because on that, I think the philosophy used to be, and I understand it from the TikTok space, was this, the idea about going viral, right? Was, no, it wasn't really figured out. And so you just improve your odds of going viral, which was the the idea for growth in the past was, well, the more you put out, the better your chances, right? There's more shots on goal. But you're saying, as we move on to this next level, at least once a day, you're training the algorithm as a whole, and

Jana Weinstein 7:46

honestly, you're in the beginning. It's not fun just to be fully transparent, because we've seen it with brands, and I've seen it with brands from start, and I've seen it with brands. I've seen when they have 11 followers and nothing on their handle. And it takes time, it takes effort, but it's when it starts to click and the algorithm starts to recognize you. You do get rewarded.

Aaron Conant 8:08

Yeah, awesome. We did have one question that comes in, and we can hold this to later, we can tackle now is just, you know, strategies to improve average order value on Tiktok.

Jana Weinstein 8:17

Shot, yeah. I mean, there's, a bunch of different tactics you can take. This may be more applicable when we when we go through, like the the approach from because there's a ton of different levers that you can pull, I think. And TikTok changes daily, right? So it's understanding kind of you have to move with TikTok. Just as an example, it used to be, they would say that between 15 and $30 was the sweet spot for for products and what you should start with and target with when you launch. But then they kind of moved up their shipping thresholds, and now they don't do any shipping subsidies until the products or the AOV is $30 right? So then they went from saying you should be doing these really, really lower price products, and now they've kind of changed that tune in, whoa, well, now 30 and $60 is really the sweet spot that you should be in, so it consistently changes. I also love bundles, which we'll talk about later. I think bundles is a great opportunity to increase your AOV, and especially, you know, if it's already products that you have in the assortment, making a bundle is great for increasing your AOV and then also additionally making the product unique to TikTok Shop. Yeah,

Aaron Conant 9:30

awesome. Another question that drops in here, how long should a brand expect for it to take, for it to quote, unquote, click,

Jana Weinstein 9:38

yeah. So again there, and we'll get into this when we talk about expectations for your first 90 days, because it's conversations that we know we have with brands day in day out, is be patient and look at metrics from a different perspective of how you would on, say, an Amazon or like a D to C channel. So I would say, stay tuned, and we'll kind of get to that as we. Move

Aaron Conant 10:00

down the presentation. Awesome. Love it. Cool. So

Jana Weinstein 10:04

creators, I do think it's really important. And if you also want to talk about like, how to increase and grow the brand quickly, partnering with the right creators is key. You want to partner, like, if you're a beauty brand, you're going to want to partner with someone whose followers resonate with your products and also aligns with your target audience. So I think that's super important. And we'll get into creators, and the importance of creators and kind of the affiliate program next. But I also think in this is kind of basic TikTok, use the right hashtags. Know what's trending, stay up to date on trends, and then we'll kind of pull this back to content, right? And posting brat summer, right? It was a brat summer. Demure was a big trend. Not all posts have to be shoppable. Take advantage, right? And it can be like I said, How do you take that? Dim your trend and make it applicable to what you're trying to do? Don't overthink it. It can be a 32nd video. So that's kind of like what I like to tell my brands as well. And then I think the last piece that's really worth speaking about here is engagement and education, because that is key, and that will also help your grand grow more quickly on the platform. You want to be engaging with your user base, and in addition to that, you want to be partnering with the creators that are promoting your product and educating them, help them understand the value proposition of your brand and your products so that they can promote it accordingly. Myth number three, people use TikTok for entertainment, not shopping. And so this is where we'll kind of pivot and focus specifically on TikTok Shop. TikTok Shop officially launched. I know I said I was there in November of 2022 but it didn't officially launch to the public until September of 2023 and then this projection was purported by Bloomberg during the first half of 2024 so a projected forecast of $17.5 billion in GM V, which that's huge, right? So what was the thinking behind that the TikTok shop user journey is not linear, and the this slide and and these facts and stats are actually directly from TikTok. 58% of users discover new brands or products on the platform. 83% of users look to TikTok for product reviews. 67% of TikTok users say that they're likely to purchase something, and then 25% of users posted content showing off a product that they bought. And I actually think that participation number is going to be important as the platform grows, and I think that number is going to increase. Myth number four, this is our final myth, but this is kind of what we'll talk about when we talk about how you'll launch your brand successfully in the third part of the webinar, TikTok Shop is a short game strategy could not be further from the truth. In our opinion, many brands I know and have spoken to, whether I was at TikTok or at an agency, we talked to brands that set up their store, they put up a few pieces of content, and then they get frustrated when they aren't generating revenue automatically, immediately. What now? How do I do this? What's going on? And it's because in order to attain sustainable growth from both an awareness and a revenue standpoint, you need to play the long game. So I have this conversation all the time too. And Aaron, I'm sure you kind of have have these conversations on the daily when you're speaking with brands. But I'll hear from a brand I want to be like guru Nanda or goalie or tart, like that's what I want to do on TikTok Shop. I know it can happen, and I see it and I want to be it, but that level of success does not happen overnight, which is why a long term strategy is extremely important.

Aaron Conant 13:59

So I think a lot of it is just that, what is the long term strategy? Yeah, right, because, and then the education, which I can't wait to get to, is in the education behind it. So that, I mean, you think about, from an Amazon plan standpoint, for a while, people have been able to walk in say, Hey, listen, things don't just sell automatically. There's a hockey stick, but the hockey stick doesn't happen for 18 months, but it's 18 months from now, right? And then that shorted up short into maybe 12 months, but it's getting started. And by the way, I just need to explain to an executive team, leadership team, Owner, founder, whoever it is, hey, listen, here's a plan, and here's the time we're going to see results. And that, I think, is what's been I like any new platform, it's been lacking because it's brand new, and everybody's trying to figure it out. So yeah, and it's

Jana Weinstein 14:46

really, we have conversations with Amazon brands all the time, and they want that same formula, right? Like, I know what it's going to take on Amazon, and they're looking for the same thing from TikTok Shop. And that can happen for two reasons. One, the platform is still really new and grown. Doing. And two, it's a totally different platform. And the content piece and like that, social piece is just very different from any other revenue channel out there right now. Yeah, and

Aaron Conant 15:12

just reminded questions in the chat with the Q and A, we'll get to them,

Jana Weinstein 15:16

perfect. So to start with the long term strategy, repeated exposure. So we talked about posting content consistently. That's important to help build trust with your user base, which in turn, will then drive conversion. By posting regularly, you will stay top of mind to your customers. Authentic content. Authenticity is key for TikTok, and by being authentic, you build credibility with your audience over time, and then brand advocates, your affiliate partners and your customers. This goes back to that participation piece can become advocates of your brand on the platform, so essentially, be like the sales people for you. Long Term efforts do allow you to analyze performance and refine your strategy to optimize growth, but I think, and we'll get to this, and this is based on the question of, like, how quickly will it take? It's just making sure that you're looking at the business correctly and looking at the metrics appropriately within the journey in time.

Aaron Conant 16:19

Awesome. 

Jana Weinstein 16:21

So that's it for the myths. There's a ton more out there, but I thought these four were crucial to tackle for the purposes of this webinar. But now I'm super excited to talk about creators. Creators are literally the life blood of TikTok, and on average, 70% of revenue is generated through creators on the platform. So I want to go through the affiliate marketplace that exists within TikTok Shop. There are two types of plans brands can participate in. There's the open plan and the target plan. With the open plan, sellers essentially upload their products to the affiliate marketplace, select a commission percentage for each product, and then any eligible creator in the affiliate program can access open plan products, giving them the opportunity to promote these items. And so one question we get asked all the time is, well, do I have the right to approve creators? And yes, you do. So that doesn't necessarily mean that every single creator that has access to your products can promote them. It just means any eligible creator that is within that affiliate program that TikTok, you know, it's TikTok selects those creators. They have an opportunity to participate. Whether you want to partner with them is still up to you. I

Aaron Conant 17:36

mean, that's one of the biggest things, right? Well, there's a couple things. One that comes to mind is, so I've got my products in the marketplace. Is there a way to make them stand out? Is it a higher commission, you know, is it the particular brands? And then the other side of it that comes up quite a bit is, if you get a, like, a very high end brand, you know, in you have a, you know, maybe an owner, founder, that's right there. Maybe it's a luxury brand that doesn't, doesn't want to have anything off brand you know communicated on the platform, like, how selective can you be? Is usually something that pops up for sure.

Jana Weinstein 18:10

So the tough part about the affiliate program is that, especially as the platform has grown, is there are so many products. There are so many brands on the platform, and the creator base is expanding weekly that it does become difficult to have your product stand out. And so there's two approaches that you can take. You can offer a crazy high commission rate if you're playing the long game. I don't love that strategy. I think it's important to be kind of in line with whatever your competitors and your vertical is doing. Usually, 15 to 20% is a sweet spot, but I've seen that fluctuate within, you know, the last couple of years. But it is important to make sure you're being competitive. But I think there are so many other levers that you can pull. I personally don't believe and they'll let me do like, a super high, you know, affiliate percentage. If you have a brand that's luxury or a little bit more timid of how they approach the affiliate program, then that's a great segue to the next slide, which is the target plan. So with the target collaboration, sellers can collaborate with specific creators, and it creates a more controlled and strategic partnership for product promotion. And unlike the open plan, where any eligible creator can apply to promote a product target, collaboration involves sellers proactively selecting creators who align closely with their brand and marketing. So that is the answer for those brands that are a little bit more particular and who they want to work with. My suggestion for success, and this is what we this is how we work with our brand partners, is to utilize both. I think the open plan is essential, especially for a new brand that does not have a large following, just to kind of like, get that word of mouth out there. But I think it also is important. To kind of figure out which creators you want to partner with that are going to consistently work with you and be able to convert into sales. Yeah, awesome.

Aaron Conant 20:09

Couple more questions that come in here. Is there an average affiliate commission rate that you'd recommend? Yeah?

Jana Weinstein 20:16

So I think usually it's 15 to 20% as the sweet spot overall. But what I usually do, because it can vary by vertical, certain verticals sometimes offer a higher commission, and so it's really important to kind of stay competitive and really understand what like brands in the space are doing. But overall, I would say like 15 to 20% is on average, where you should be. Yeah, awesome.

Aaron Conant 20:37

Next one is around opening up a TikTok Shop. When I went to open up TikTok Shop late last year, the sign up required birth date and social security number. Why is it required? And is it still required to open up TikTok Shop? So

Jana Weinstein 20:51

it is required for all brands that are not publicly traded company in the US, and the reason that it is required is because of it's not a TikTok rule, per se, because transactions are done within the platform. It actually is an IRS rule. So it's part of the inform act, if you want to Google that after that is the reason it's not a by dance requirement. It actually is just like a US federal requirement. And it's last four now it used to be the entire social security number.

Aaron Conant 21:23

What should be the approach regarding another question that drops in here, what should be the approach regarding product selection for TikTok Shop, for a brand that has a large assortment of SKUs, 1000 plus? We'll say,

Jana Weinstein 21:36

No, I love that question. I think starting with a curated assortment is extremely important. You can definitely have your entire brand catalog listed. That's fine. The more products you have, just the more it is to upkeep your storefront and make sure that everything is optimized accordingly. But with content, I really do think it's necessary to be curated in your approach. And really, really think about products that are going to resonate with the TikTok user and are also price point appropriate, right? So if you have a product that is $350 retail, probably not the product I would start with on

Aaron Conant 22:12

TikTok Shop. Oh, there the questions are flow in that one. What are post rates based off of her sample setting. Is there a way to increase the chances of a creator posting after receiving a sample? Yeah,

Jana Weinstein 22:27

so it's all about the approach, right? Like, that's why creator partnerships are really, really important. And I recommend utilizing the open plan and like that targeted approach in tandem, because it's really, really building that rapport with creators to ensure that they are partnering with you to make your product be the one that they're focusing on, because, say, you are a water bottle brand, right? There's a good chance that that creator is getting 300 if they're a good creator, and they've done a lot of GMB on the platform, they're gonna get a ton of interest. And so I think, and I think it has become more prevalent as of recent, instead of just relying on that commission model for partnering with affiliates to do like, a little flat fee plus commission in order to guarantee that kind of like, the juice is worth the squeeze. And I think as the business starts to grow, I think you refine your partnerships, but that kind of is something that's newer, is kind of working off of that flat fee plus commission for targeted creators that you want to partner with.

Aaron Conant 23:23

Yeah, awesome. When you do a targeted collaboration and send out your 1000 invites to start, how many can you expect to accept it? And should you be offering only one product or many products for the Creator to pick from?

Jana Weinstein 23:35

You can take either approach, and we've, we've done both with brands. Um, we for a brand that just really isn't sure, or we've done the test and learn where we have kind of done that mass outreach, and we have sent a ton of products, like we put the catalog up, and for 30 days, we've said, Okay, what products are the creators leaning towards? And then we've refined that approach after we see what the creators are gravitating towards. And what's fun about that is you actually, when you see what the creators want, it makes you think about your product assortment, what kind of bundles you can create. And it kind of really, really helps you from a product perspective and an assortment perspective of like, what you should be offering on TikTok Shop.

Aaron Conant 24:16

Yeah, awesome. The next one is regards to Canadian based companies. So a couple two in here that we want to tackle. You know, we're Canadian based companies. We have a small office in the US. Can we still have a shop? And the other question is, are there workarounds for launching a TikTok Shop for a brand that's not based in the US? Good

Jana Weinstein 24:33

question. These are all good questions. See, this is what we could have with all the content that we have. We really, we should, probably should break it into good question. If you have a US entity, so if you have a US based employee that can provide the information that we discussed earlier with the social security number, like the ubo information and you have a US business entity, it's totally fine. Doesn't matter if you're in Canada. Isn't. Long as you have that and we do work with brands that are headquartered globally, but do have an office in the US and an employee that has filled out that information with when it comes to handles, the recommendation from tikshop is going to be unless you have a giant following, don't worry about transferring your handle. Just build out a new handle in the US. You can do global handle transfers. However, they do take a minimum of 90 days, and it goes through a pretty complex process at TikTok so and TikTok itself like they're the ones that have to own that they're like no agency you know has the capabilities to do that. So again, speed to market if you are fine, if you have a large following, and you want to wait it out until you can transfer your Canadian handle over. You can do that. It's you're gonna probably just waste a half a year between the transfer and getting your shop live. Unfortunately,

Aaron Conant 25:51

yeah, awesome. How many samples are typically required for an open creator campaign? Did you say 1000 I said 1000 but I don't know. Maybe.

Jana Weinstein 25:59

Well, we do. We do that. That's actually on point. You can do as many as you want, but at the end of the day, it goes back to the same thing we were talking about with affiliate commission percentage right there. Our brands are super competitive, and they're willing to play hard. So we actually recommend that you do 1000 product seeds per month. And you can do that in different ways, right? People do inventory. Is another thing we'll talk about, which is super important. So if you need to be a little bit more flexible with your inventory and where you're in stock, and you want to spread those seeds amongst 10 SKUs, that's fine, but it is always better, especially when you're launching, to really launch with that hero product and really be focused in on that awesome and then the last one.

Aaron Conant 26:40

And then we're going to move on. We'll get back to another how to another, another batch of questions. How do you go about picking the best creator that will resonate with your

Jana Weinstein 26:48

brand? Sometimes it's testing and learning. I will say that when you look at TikTok and you look at the top performing videos, sometimes and our we have a fantastic affiliate team, and when, when we do our weekly meetings with our clients, they come to the table with top quality and top performing, because oftentimes they're very different. And so I recommend, and that's why is doing a combined approach of open end target plan is testing and learning to figure out which creators are going to resonate, what type of video is going to resonate for your product.

Aaron Conant 27:22

Awesome, we'll wait for some pour in. Again, you have questions, drop them in the chat, in the Q and A and we'll get to them. We're gonna go through a few more slides, and we'll tackle another batch of questions.

Jana Weinstein 27:34

Awesome, okay, well, this is the third part. There's a lot to this part, but this is probably where we're gonna go through a lot of the questions that are probably rolling through the chat right now. Through the chat right now. So we've debunked some myths, we've explained why it's better to play the long game. We've talked about the different creator partnerships. And so now I want to walk you through how you should approach TikTok Shop in order to get your brand position to scale in this competitive space. And I love this slide. The house slide is my favorite. So we always talk about building your strategy from the ground up. So what does that mean? And the foundation really is building a healthy shop. You want to make sure that your account is set up properly, your integrations are done in sync, and everything is looking good. Your storefront is merchandise. Your listings are optimized, but that is just the first step. And I think when we talk about brands that get frustrated, they don't realize or understand that the ongoing management of the shop is just as important as the setup of the shop. Violation points are a thing that can be really frustrating for for TikTok Shop sellers, they can be anything from a shipping delay, a setup error, a listing issue, and sometimes you'll get a violation, where, when we talk to our TikTok reps, they'll look at us and say, Yeah, I don't know why you got that. That's not That's not a thing, and they'll help us resolve it. So that's really important, because there are different milestones within violation points, and when you hit a certain threshold, it can affect your capabilities to execute on your content strategy. So when you hit a certain milestone, you may not be able to participate in campaigns. When you hit another milestone, you may not be able to add any product listing. So it's really important to make sure that your shop is always in a healthy position, because at the end of the day, if you don't have that healthy foundation, you won't be able to scale or do anything. From a content perspective, once you have a healthy shop, you understand how to maintain it. It's really important to kind of lay that organic foundation. So you want to be posting daily, as we've discussed, with a combination of content on your brand handle and also utilizing your affiliate strategy. And so I want to talk about this as well, because as we were talking about the process of. How you partner with affiliates that can take time, right? So by the time you do your outreach, you approve your creators, you send them samples, and then they post that all takes time, and in some instances, that can take, what, 30 days. So it's really important, especially in the beginning, to post even some of that content that we talked about that's like brand and spell or educational or bloopers post like content on your brand handle, just to make sure that while you're getting your affiliate strategy going, the algorithm is starting to recognize you as a seller. And then this is another mistake I see people do all the time, is they're so used to just like associating TikTok with ads that they launch their store immediately and then just start putting paid media behind it, but I do think it's really important to kind of set your foundation in organic content. Have some content supply going, get some GMV, get some revenue off of a few posts, and then that's where you take the opportunity to amplify using the different types of shopping ads. So there are three product shopping ads, video shopping ads and live shopping ads. So once you kind of have your foundation, you've got your organic posting cadence down, that's when you really amplify to boost awareness and drive sales.

Aaron Conant 31:13

Awesome. So a couple more questions here. Recommend. Is there a recommendation on seeding with products from a marketplace? Should it be the same assortment for everyone. And the other one is, what are you seeing for our for row as for live shopping?

Jana Weinstein 31:30

So live is an I'll start with the live. Live is an interesting one. Um, again, if you speak to TikTok, they are pushing live hard live. And I will say I've seen the numbers enjoy in it is an absolute. It's amazing. It's astounding. The setups, the revenue that they drive over there. It's we aspire to do that right here in the US. I think it's just taken a little bit more time for the US consumer to get comfortable with live streaming. It is a heavier lift, right? You talk about Studio, you talk about hosting, you talk about the frequency, right? TikTok recommends you going live multiple hours at a time, multiple times a week. How I like to look at live streaming is more of a marketing opportunity, especially in the beginning, because if you think about it, and I'm talking about all these things you need to do in order to get your shop set up and in order for the shop to scale, I think it's really important to kind of get your core competencies down. Make sure that your shop is is healthy and optimized, make sure that you've got a great affiliate strategy in place, make sure that you your content supply is there, and then figure out how to utilize the paid media piece. For me, I think marketing right now is more like of a marketing play. It's another way for the algorithm to familiarize itself with you. Again. You can also go live, and we do this all the time with brand partners, is go live in a more low key way, right? Go live if you're a fashion brand, go live in your showroom, right? If you're a beauty brand, like do a get ready with me. There's different ways to tackle live. We as Blue Wheel have a beautiful creative studio in Brooklyn, New York. But the reason that we don't have a live streaming as a part of our assortment right now is there's so much to do and so much to build with all the other service offerings that that's where our focus is right now. That being said, there are wonderful, specialized live stream agencies that we partner with frequently, that I would recommend, but I would say, when you do kind of the house build, I would say, like on top of the roof the chimney, would be a live streaming strategy. And then what was the other question? Remind me, sorry, was

Aaron Conant 33:33

around seeing with products from a marketplace. Should it be the same assortment for everyone?

Jana Weinstein 33:39

Meaning like Amazon versus TikTok versus,

Aaron Conant 33:44

I'm not sure, but we can wait. Yeah, I mean,

Jana Weinstein 33:46

I this is an easy one. The more exclusive and the more specialized your product is to TikTok Shop, the better

Aaron Conant 33:53

awesome shopping ads is this the same as ad manager within TikTok and where and where, now you have search is an option. So,

Jana Weinstein 34:01

sir, so shop and search is that's where you would do product shopping ads, which would be most similar to like, what you would utilize on like an Amazon but shopping ads are different. There it is a segment of like tick, like business center and TikTok ads, manager shopping ads, when you're talking specifically about LSA, BSA and PSA, those are TikTok Shop specific.

Aaron Conant 34:26

Awesome. I mean, it's funny. I love this slide. And we can keep rolling up, we'll keep feeling questions as they come in. I mean, this, that slide that you were just on was the was the standard slide, right? Get your account set up, get your inventory, get everything in place. Step two, make sure the content is there. It's the right content, it's optimized. And after you have those two things to shop, this is on Amazon, Walmart. You've got to have the account, you've got to have the inventory. Everything's got to be good. You got to get the content, it's got to be optimized. And then you do paid media on top of it. I love it.

Jana Weinstein 34:57

Reverse that. Yeah. So let's go back to onboarding, right? So I know onboarding can be a huge pain point for brands, and one of the reasons why a lot of brands either walk away when they start the onboarding process or they just avoid launching a shop altogether when they see what it takes and it's also can be difficult to troubleshoot. TikTok Shop actually markets itself as a self serve platform, but speaking from experience, it's not the easiest platform to navigate, and so I think that is definitely like fear not, and that's why you have agency partners like Blue Wheel, like this is what we do day in, day out. But I empathize, I sympathize, especially if you're a brand and you've got 100 other things to do and other marketplaces to manage it is not the most seamless experience. To onboard your brand on a TikTok Shop,

Aaron Conant 35:45

and this is one of the main things that people are just looking for help with, right? Everybody's got 150 things to do each day. They can only, they only have time for 100 and to go through and learn this one time, which once you're set up, you're never going to use it again, unless you switch a brand, it's just one of those things. You haven't done it enough to know all the different questions, the pitfalls. So, yeah, partnering with an agency is in this space is, I want to say, it's essential, but it's

Jana Weinstein 36:16

definitely, it definitely helps. So within this slide, the two things I want to touch upon, we kind of alluded to it earlier, but having a healthy inventory position for product sales and product seeding, you have to remember both, right? So your inventory is going to be used for seeding, and then on the other side, revenue. So that is why I always say focus on launching with a hero product to start, unless you are one of the few brands that have unlimited inventory, and I know a lot of times inventory is not segmented by channel. And so you're lucky enough to have an omni channel inventory strategy where Amazon's not going to take it all if they have, you know, a good week in sales. And so that's why I think launching with a hero product is super important, both from an inventory perspective, and then also, as we talked about earlier, just from a content perspective. Content perspective and a content strategy perspective. But I do want to talk about promo pricing and campaigns, because I have heard this a lot where more so, like a year ago, than we do today. But, you know, TikTok Shop is just, you know, there's a bunch of brands from Asia on there. It's heavily liquidated. It's discounted. You know, you hear temu and I, I'm not gonna lie, there are brands that will mark up their products really high and then slash the prices and do like an 80% flash sale. But like, they are few and far between, and that's not our recommendation as an agency partner. But I do want to talk about promo pricing as it relates to if you're going live a flash sale, right? That's super important campaign periods, Black Friday Cyber Monday and CO funded coupons is something that I absolutely love, that TikTok does. They had two different campaigns for Black Friday, Cyber Monday, a 20% off coupon leading into the week, the week, and then 30% off for brands. It is half subsidized by TikTok, so the brand, essentially is only paying for a 30% promo. 15% TikTok is subsidizing the other 15% and then, because it's still a new platform, TikTok, on their own, is offering a whole bunch of subsidies directly to the user. So by not participating in these programs and all your competitors are, you're just leaving opportunity on the table. So table, and then we kind of were speaking about this earlier, but exclusive products, and I don't mean to ruin your product assortment and create a brand new product from scratch. What I'm referring to is, is there a product that you want to liquidate or move through the inventory? Maybe you can think of a unique, creative strategy to do so, and you have a little bit of flexibility on pricing. Maybe that's the avenue for how you launch your your your store on TikTok. And then I love this story. We work with a with a brand partner, and it's in the consumable space, and they did a bundle of three different flavors of their product as an exclusive TikTok Shop offering. And what they saw is a halo effect afterwards on their Amazon business, because on the Amazon storefront, they sold this three flavor pack as individual flavors, so people were kind of going and buying just their favorite flavor from that pack that they had bought on

Aaron Conant 39:18

TikTok Shop. Oh, a couple other questions that have come in here. Actually, they're both around fulfillment as a whole, which is interesting, because if you can get, you know, a lot of times, you know, outside, if you have a fulfillment partner that can do this, or you have your own warehouse, you can individually pick Pack Ship easier, without having to bring in a co pack or anything else. So I'm going to read two questions here. What are the pro recommendations of various fulfillment options? And the other one is fulfillment, but by TikTok versus offering other offerings such as Amazon's MCF, and do you have any recommendations there? So yeah.

Jana Weinstein 39:54

So there are rules that have been implemented. You have to have certain thresholds. Now, again, this is one of. Those things where it's like you have to be in the know of how TikTok changes day over day. There are certain thresholds for fulfilled by TikTok that you need to be in order to have, in order to be in that program right now, I do also still think that they're having some growing pains on the FBT side. Great things about multi channel fulfillment. There are some wonderful integration partners that is highly recommended by TikTok, that we partner with, that can work through the MCF. So that's definitely an option I would recommend. And then there are a ton of different commerce partnership options. Obviously, there's Shopify, WooCommerce, Salesforce said, commerce like there is a ton of different integration options, and there's an entire commerce partnerships team that we work with in order to ensure that our brand partners are utilizing the best one that's the most cost efficient and also just like the easiest and best to work with.

Aaron Conant 40:53

Awesome. Love it. Cool.

Jana Weinstein 40:55

Okay, so a little bit less on this slide, just because we've kind of gone through this as we've spoken about affiliate and creator Partnerships and Education, but just a couple of things to touch on. I think it's really important. I know we talked about creator partnerships and getting these going and flat fee plus commission, but I do want to make sure that when you're launching and you're newer to TikTok Shop. It kind of is a must to enroll your products within the open plan to kind of get that flywheel spinning and kind of get your brand name out there. I think that's super duper important. And then lastly, if you are a large brand that has a really stringent legal team, or you have a ton of layers of approval in order for content to be approved. Then ultimately, like you may have some hurdles scaling on on TikTok Shop, especially for these enterprise brands, I would kind of say before you kind of take the leap onto TikTok Shop, you need to loosen the reins and recognize that TikTok content is driven by authenticity, and so you kind of have to get your normal marketing brain kind of kind of switch it a little bit and kind of loosen the reins on what kind of content you actually will allow to be, you know, partnering with from an affiliate perspective, or even doing on your brand handle. Because, like we've said, what generates revenue and the content that works isn't always the content that that you think will be top performing. Okay, so expectation, so I do hear more often than not, there are unforeseen roadblocks with onboarding. There are delays with integrations. They people can't get TikTok to help with with their troubleshooting issues. And there's just an overall sense of, I tried to do the setup process, and it's not working in general. So additionally, there all are rules that TikTok does impose on new sellers, and those rules can change constantly. An example of one right now that's a that's a little bit frustrating for brands is if you're a new seller, and this is another 1000, but new sellers are only given 1000 initial outreach messages to creators, so once you use that 1000 then it's kind of like a paid applier, in the sense that now affiliate GM V is necessary in order for you to unlock more messages, and so sometimes that can cause delays in affiliate outreach. So I'm saying this for two reasons. That's why it's really important to come to the table and pull all the levers and have, like, a long term strategy in place. But I just want to talk about real quickly, like, what your expectation should be within the first 90 days, and I don't mean the first 90 days of you starting to onboard your TikTok Shop, once your shop is integrated and live, this is metrics that you should be focusing on for the first 90 days. So for the first 30 days, you're really only looking at how many creators Am I reaching out to? How many am I approving? How many samples Am I sending, whether it's open plan, targeted plan, or both. When you hit month two, that's when you can kind of see, okay, how many videos of my posted, what percentage of those have actually converted into GMV news flash? It's probably, at this point, going to be a small percentage. And then month three is really where you can start to be like, Okay, let's start to look at analytics from a high level. How many units have I sold? Which creators have posted more than once? Of the creators I partnered with, who's made a sale? And then you can start to look at ROAs. And I do think there was a ROAs question that we skipped over, because I know there's been a lot, but usually one to start would would be what like you would want to look for it at, like within or like ROAs. But I will say there's something really cool within the platform called GMV Max, which is like, kind of like a new advertising solution for TikTok Shop. And it kind of brings in, like an AI piece of the puzzle, and people have been able to see. And we have seen directly ourselves some really amazing results. So I think, kind of like almost in conclusion, we, you know, building out a long term TikTok Shop strategy, it's a heavy lift, and a lot of brands don't have the infrastructure and full transparency to pull all of the different levers and stay up to date, because this is also a big thing. Staying up to date, because TikTok Shop is still new and growing, you got to stay up to date on new initiatives, new updates, all the things that TikTok does, from an operational level and also on a content level, just being able to roll with the punches and be really nimble, and kind of like, shift your strategy. And that's kind of like, where TikTok Shop partners come into play. I when I was at TikTok Shop, this was the team that I helped build, so I'm super passionate about it. And essentially what a TikTok Shop partner is is just a third party service provider that's authorized by TikTok to essentially support brands and help them scale. So I come from that team within tech talk. Blue Wheel is a TSP, and so just know that we were definitely here to help. We, we love it. We work with brands of all different shapes and sizes. And it's we kind of like take some of that frustration and that and that heavy lift off of your plate.

Aaron Conant 46:23

I love it. If there are other questions, feel free to drop them in the chat or the Q and A. We'll get to them. One here, I'm in Brazil. Do we have a date to launch TikTok in Brazil? TikTok Shop here, it's

Jana Weinstein 46:37

been on the road map for for quite some time. I don't know the newest update. I know Mexico is, is on, is on the pipe, there, there. There's definitely a ton of countries that there will be launching in. I don't know the specifics on on launch date for Brazil, but I know it's been definitely top of mind for quite some

Aaron Conant 46:55

time. Yeah, awesome. Yeah. I mean, I guess we're at the key takeaways. Again, we can capture any any additional questions as we get to the end here. Feel free to drop in the chat or the Q and A just a quick reminder to more than happy to connect anybody with the team over at Blue Wheel. They're great friends, partners, supporters to a ton of brands in the network. They do a lot of education with our group as a whole. So really appreciate the team over at Blue Wheel. If you have any questions or need to follow up? Yeah, more than happy to connect you with them. I'd love to have a conversation with you as well. Pick your brain and Hey, what are the biggest pain points? What are other topics for webinars or dinner we're doing? Also, more than happy to share across the board, newest trend strategies, partners that are popping up, that are changing the digital landscape and helping the winners when they're more than happy to set some time aside. So, yeah, you want to go through some key takeaways, and then we'll ask if we can go back a slide. So we'll go through the key takeaways, and we'll jump back

Jana Weinstein 47:52

a slide. Yeah, for sure. So TikTok Shop is both a revenue and an awareness channel that can open your brand to a whole new user base, one that I think they kind of have, they've they've got a market on Gen Z, you know, as we know that then no other place in space does. And I think that would be like, question number one we hear from brands all the time is like, how do I get in front of that demographic? Um, creators are the lifeblood of TikTok, and it is crucial to lean into their authentic content in order to be able to scale. If you don't want to lean into creators, whether it is via targeted and or open plan, then this is probably not the right avenue for you, and that's okay. But if you don't want to lean into authenticity and creator partnerships, it will be very challenging for you to scale, and then it takes many levers to launch and scale your TikTok Shop. Don't get deterred. And this is how we'll go back a slide. There are experts that can help

Aaron Conant 48:50

you, yeah? And that was a question. He'll back a slide on the capabilities offered by a tsp.

Jana Weinstein 48:55

Yeah, for sure. So they break it down into five buckets, shop operations and management. So that would encompass onboarding your store, getting your seller center set up, and, you know, handling, obviously, as a brand new provider. But we would give you an onboarding checklist of like, everything you need in order to onboard onto the seller center. We would pick an integrations partner with you, just seeing how your OMS system is set up. We would handle all of that, and then the ongoing shop management, right? So everything we talked about that bottom foundation in the house, making sure the shop is always optimized or on top of any changes, any sort of issues, violations, how do we get those resolved? Anything that's shop related or operationally related? That's what a TikTok Shop partner can help you with creator and affiliate strategy. Break that down into two buckets, both open and targeted, right? So doing mass outreach at scale via the open plan, a lot of you know agency partners utilize, like special software that can really, really get that mass outreach up into the 10s of 1000s, and then doing that target. Creator, building list and figuring out the right niche creators that will be the best partners for you. In addition to that paid media and really leaning into the different types of shopping ads, I will say it is important too, when you are going to onboard on a TikTok Shop, whether you kind of just carve out a space or place of your budget, really make sure you have a budget dedicated to shopping ads, specifically, super duper important when you're amplifying your organic presence. Short video content production, right? So content creation, we've got a creative team so helping you kind of get that content, content supply up and creating content. Because, like I said, I can say it's a lot blue in the face, but it is intimidating, and people just don't have bandwidth to go live one to two times a day or post videos one to two times a day, and then live stream production and moderation, not something that we are taking on right now, but we do have partners that we work with that are specifically specialized in live streaming.

Aaron Conant 50:59

Awesome. Another question, if a brand reaches out to 1000 influencers for targeted calibration, what percentage or number of influencers can typically be expected to respond positively?

Jana Weinstein 51:10

So that's a tough one, because it depends on product category. How saturated is the category? There are under penetrated categories, like kids is a perfect example, or pets, where kind of they're newer, they're newer to TikTok Shop and so, like, that was a great we're partnering with both brands in that space, because it's a huge opportunity. 10% I would say. But like, again, it's really hard. And I know we have this conversation too, like day in, day out with brands. It's really hard to do, like, concrete data and information right now, because the platform is just so new and changing every day. But like, that's kind of like a loose kind of metric I would give, and it also depends on how many you reach out to. I think this is a perfect example of how the platform has evolved. Six months ago, it was all about this kind of, like, mass outreach at scale. And so advice from TikTok was you should be reaching out to 20,000 30,000 like, the numbers were astronomically insane. And then all of a sudden, I, you know, started to see a shift. And I always thought it in my head, right? I'm like, why are we doing mass but like, we should really be thinking conversion. And then this whole creator partnerships came into play, where you're starting to do the flat fee plus commission. Like, how are you? Oh, wow, this is increasing content supply, and we're getting creators to work with us on multiple products, on multiple posts. And so that became kind of like, okay, still do that, but maybe not as heavily as you were. And like, let's really build out that creator partnerships piece. And that's what I mean by it's really important to kind of like have your head kind of in the game all the time, because strategies change very, very quickly, and we've had to kind of like pivot and shift on a dime.

Aaron Conant 52:54

Well, awesome. Jana, thanks so much for your time today. I don't have any other questions that have rolled in, but again, encourage everybody have more questions, more than happy to connect you with the team over at Blue Wheel. Look for a follow up email from us. We'd love to have a conversation with you as well. Again, if you're in the New York City area next, next Thursday, 1212. We're gonna do a full day event. We'd love to see you there. And with that, we're gonna wrap up this webinar. Thanks again, Jana, for your time today. Everybody take care already. We'll see it. Bye.