What Social Commerce Strategy to Adopt for the Holidays?

In this blog, we will be diving into the wonder of social commerce. Many have talked about it but few have a clear strategy. Yet it is a channel that is experiencing exponential growth lately and on its way to becoming a major driver of revenue for any DTC merchant. 

What is social commerce?

Social commerce is any type of commerce that starts from social media or a community environment. In social commerce, the seller might not be you but an influencer or someone with influence, small or large. Social commerce is about harnessing the power of the network effect between people.

What is the origin of social media?

It all depends on how you look at it. Some will argue that Tupperware parties were an early form of social commerce. Most will agree that social commerce started to appear in the mid-2000s when ecommerce sites started to add social features such as reviews, ratings, and share buttons. In fact, in 2005, Yahoo! actually coined the term “social commerce”. 

Late 2000s, with the growth of Facebook, brands started to experiment with social media stores.

In the 2010s, social media platforms like Pinterest, Instagram and Wechat started to add buy buttons, tag products.

In China, it started to accelerate in 2016 when brands started to experiment with livestream shopping 

By 2020, liveshopping in China was already a massive driver of ecommerce revenue and with the pandemic it made the movement completely mainstream. 

What approach to social commerce is most suitable for your brand?

Every brand can benefit from a social commerce strategy. That strategy will depend on your brand and goals. 

If you’re a newer DTC brand you may look for growing your brand awareness. In this case working with a great number of creators on commission is a good strategy. The benefit is the relatively low cost which is mainly sending samples of your product to the creator. The downside is the time consumed. If you work with a few creators it’s quite manageable but if you work with 50-100 creators at any given time, it requires a diligent system to track, source and manage your program. 

TikTok has changed the game with affiliate marketing. The platform makes it easy to source creators and also democratizes commission of sales as a pure revenue source for creators. Indeed until recently, most creators were asking for a flat fee per post and commission making it hard for smaller DTC to scale this channel. You often need to work with a great number of creators to find the one that converts the best for your brands. With the advent of TIkTok, merchants can now see the performance of each creator on the platform and the type of product they have good success with. The data is open and quite interesting. Sites like Kalodata are our favorite. 

If you are a more established brand, you may care more about brand equity. In this case, working with a smaller set of creators on a retainer or even hiring them as part of your organization. In this case, it’s all about relationship building between the audience and your brand. Livestream is a great opportunity to build community and engagement. Adding a commerce component will turn engagements into direct revenue. 

How to activate a social commerce strategy?

1. Start with the basics

• Audience: Who you want to reach, what they like, where they are online.

• Platforms: Each one functions differently.

• TikTok → quick discover, impulse buy - Algorithm pushing content in front of new audience - great for shoppable livestream and video - Highly recommended to use TikTok Shop

• Instagram → story, Livestream - a great place to activate your existing followers - Solution like eStreamly with their shoppable video & shoppable livestream direct to DM are quite interesting for this channel

• Facebook → group, brand page - Demographic is skewed older, but with disposable income and used to shop livestream. eStreamly is again a good software for this channel.  

• Pinterest → people search products - “SEO” plays with shoppable content. The platform is growing in popularity among Gen Z. 

• Youtube → long form content - this is where you can narrate your brand and product story. It is much harder to drive commerce although amazing businesses are built on top of Youtube for awesome story tellers. 

2. Setup your commerce

• Turn on native shops or use software like eStreamly should you want to remain in control over the experience, drive first party data and manage your cost.

• Sync product catalog, always up-to-date.

• Add product tag in post/video so it is easy to go from watch → buy.

3. Make Selling Content

• Livestream: shows products, answers questions, and offers deals. Something we saw recently working well - adding gamification. For example, give the viewers the opportunity to win a sizable prize if they share their order number. Make the selection of a winner a piece of content and repeat. Pick a host that is entertaining, focus on 3-5 products per show. Be frequent, authentic and have fun

• Shoppable video link to checkout: Work with influencers that tend to be more interested in commission. Don’t forget to look inside your organization. Someone in your business may already be creating content. Celebrate them and empower them to represent your brand, you might be really surprised. Check out the incredible story of Battlbox success driven by finding a customer truly passionate about the brand and becoming the ambassador - the live ecommerce podcast

4. Build Community

• Use poll, challenge, Q&A. Best content is not about selling, but is giving value. Remember the basics of Marketing: you must answer: “What’s in it for me?” If your content doesn’t have a strong answer, you’re missing out. 

• Empower the super fan.

5. Smooth Payment & Journey

• Optimize for low shopping friction. Leverage technology like eStreamly or TikTok Shop. Here is an interesting article on the top social commerce platform

• Connect CRM & analytics for tracking.

6. Test & Grow

• Look at CTR, order value, repeat buy, ROI.

• Test content style, video length, CTA.

• Scale what works — best creator, format, time slot.

Tip: Start small on one platform. Do 2–3 livestream + some shoppable video. Measure, then expand multi-channel when you find success.

Anyhow, as you look at your social commerce strategy don’t forget the most important - have fun doing it. Social commerce is about connecting people to your brand, it’s about authenticity. If you don’t have fun yourself with it, how can you expect your viewers to engage, tag along and have fun with you?

About the Author

Nicolas Bailliache is the cofounder of eStreamly, a shoppable livestream and video commerce software company. eStreamly empowers you to build a scalable video commerce ecosystem—turning every video and livestream into a shoppable moment across every channel that matters - web, ads, email, social, SMS and more.