How to sell with live commerce tools

The service turned out to be a stunning success, which was additionally supported by the Singles Day, an event popular in China where lonely Chinese buy themselves gifts, most often electronics. McKinsey data shows that the first 30 minutes of a promotional campaign on Taobao Live generated $ 7.5 billion in sales.

What is Live Commerce

The concept created as part of the Taobao Live service is called Live Commerce. This term refers to the immediate sale of products via live broadcasts. Broadcasts of this type most often take place on social media such as Twitter, Facebook or TikTok.

During such transmission, users can ask questions and comment on the presented products. They can also buy them with one click, without leaving the portal and logging in. This makes the shopping journey much shorter when compared to traditional influencer marketing models.

How and why live commerce works

Live commerce supports brands primarily in two areas related to building value:

• Accelerating Conversions - The very idea of ​​Live Commerce is related more to funshopping than serious purchasing decisions and can be considered as a way of entertainment and leisure. Therefore, in funshopping, emotions play a greater role and decisions are made faster, especially if broadcasters decide to additionally encourage buyers with time-limited offers.
• Improving the brand image - Live commerce is a way to reach younger users, especially those interested in live broadcasts. According to data from McKinsey, some brands are seeing an increase in awareness among young users by up to 20 percent thanks to the use of live commerce.

Meta, the owner of Facebook, indicates that nearly half (exactly 48 percent) of US users buy products via social media.

SocialMedia Today data shows that sales generated using live streaming have reached $ 119 billion. The number of users who take part in live commerce broadcasts has exceeded 384 million, which means almost half of all platform users.

Types of Live Commerce

The fact that live commerce requires live broadcasting significantly limits the scope of this type of activity. However, this does not mean that this activity is limited to social media itself.

Marketplace

Live Commerce was initiated by TaoBao, one of the largest marketplaces in the world and as such can be associated with these types of platforms. The trend was noticed by a veteran of the industry - eBay, which launched eBay Live, a service dedicated to selling collectible goods such as cards and games.

Live auctions

Even more conservative industries have also noticed the potential of live commerce. Christie's and Sotheby's auction houses have made it possible to participate in an online art auction, which in practice is live commerce. It is also a combination of the atmosphere of the auction room and the availability of participation via the Internet.

Traditional auction houses are not the pioneers of this type of sale. The startup Whatnot has made live streamed online auctions a key part of its business. Users can buy collectibles, including comics and cards. The company has raised $ 225 million from investors for the further development of the platform.

Cooperation with influencers

Live commerce is great for cooperation with influencers active in social media. Cooperation with opinion leaders operating in social media is particularly effective when a company wants to reach younger recipients with its products. GoodCompany data shows that up to 44 percent of Gen Z (born between 1995 and 2012) take into consideration influencers' hints when making purchases.

Tutorials

Instructional and tutorial videos are one of the most popular types of content on the Internet. They work especially well in the beauty and fashion segment, where broadcasters share their experience and give tips related to, for example, makeup.

Live broadcasting of events

Live commerce is also possible as part of live broadcasts of various events. The breakthrough was a broadcast done in 2015 by Lauren Conrad from the New York Fashion Week, in which participants could immediately buy the presented clothes.

What to sell via Live Commerce

Data collected by the consulting company McKinsey indicate that Live Commerce is particularly suitable for the sale and promotion of specific goods. This is reflected in the share of specific product categories in the streams.

• 35.6% - fashion and accessories
• 7.6% - Beauty products are present in 7.6%. streams
• 7.4% - fresh food
• 4.6% - consumer electronics
• 3.6% - home decoration products
• 0.2% - content related to local events

How to start operating in the live commerce model

The presence of mature brands such as Taobao or eBay indicates that Live Commerce is a model that can support not only startups and young brands, but also larger and more developed players. In practice, any brand can start working in this model, as long as it adheres to a few rules.

Scouting the market

Before the company starts operations on a larger scale, it will be necessary to conduct tests with selected products, influencers and technologies.

The first actions should collect data and experiences, and thus - should be carefully measured.

Optimization

If the first attempts are convincing and effective, it is worth further optimizing activities while increasing their scale. It is worth including other groups of recipients and product segments for testing. At each stage, it is necessary to test activities and study their effectiveness.

Depending on the results obtained, Live Commerce can be included in the overall mix of promotional activities, become its core or just an addition.

Depending on the effectiveness and scale, build an internal team dealing with live commerce or hire an agency that specializes in similar activities.

Development

When a company has already developed procedures related to running live commerce activities, it is possible to reach for new, innovative tools such as augmented reality, which will allow users to engage even more effectively.

It is always worth remembering about analytics and, along with the development of the scale of operation, obtain information and draw insights from systems in order to reach your target group even more effectively.

Summary

Live Commerce is, like new types of social media, a natural element of technological progress. Therefore, companies should take a closer look at how to conduct such activities and introduce at least elements of them into their daily practice.

If you want to find out how you can conduct live commerce activities more effectively, please contact us!