TikTok Shop

Enabling creators to evaluate products and manage a curated Showcase for their audience.

Introduction

Helping creators sell merch to their followers

At TikTok Shop, I led the experience of enabling content creators to effectively sell merchandise to their followers. In return for promoting and selling products, creators earn a commission.

For creators, it’s important to evaluate products they’re interested in and manage those products — their Showcase, or curated storefront — so their selections are thoughtfully curated for their audience. Followers can discover these products through a creator’s profile or when they come across a product video in their feed.

Product evaluation

Creators struggled to discover what to do next

In order to curate their Showcase, creators had previously found difficulty discovering and adding products. Out of a UK survey of 547 people, 33.3% cited difficulty choosing a product via TikTok Shop. Most of the feedback pointed to the lack of discoverability, once viewing a product, of what to do next.

33.3%

Cited difficulty choosing a product via TikTok Shop

547

Creators surveyed in the UK

What creators need to evaluate a product

When prompting what information is critical in evaluating a product to add to their Showcase, they reported the following:

Price Competitively priced products are more likely to sell. Prices that are too low may raise concerns about counterfeit products. 67%
Samples Products offering free samples are more desirable. Creators previously requested samples but often never heard back from sellers. 40%
Customer reviews Ratings and review details help creators assess product quality before requesting or purchasing samples. 36%
Sale count Low sales can dissuade creators from promoting an item. Top-selling, trending, and “easy to sell” products are more attractive. 32%
Commission Products with higher commission rates are naturally more attractive to creators. 32%
Previous buyer product page next to the creator Product Marketplace product page

Previously, adding products to a Showcase was separated from the core TikTok Shop experience. Creators had to navigate to the Product Marketplace — a separate destination that largely served the same product discovery function as Shop, but was specifically designed for adding products to their Showcase.

This separation created two key problems: the Product Marketplace was difficult to discover, and creators encountered two different product detail experiences depending on where they entered from.

Three product detail explorations for creator evaluation and Showcase actions

Bringing Showcase actions into TikTok Shop

Rather than sending creators to a separate marketplace, I brought product evaluation and Showcase management directly into TikTok Shop. I used progressive disclosure to keep the existing shopping experience lightweight — a bottom sheet surfaced essential information first, then expanded to reveal the details and actions creators needed to confidently add a product to their Showcase.

Early affordance exploration for creator actions on the product page
Second affordance exploration for creator actions on the product page
Third affordance exploration for creator actions on the product page
Origami prototype of the product page expanding from a compact sheet to creator details

My final execution involved a scalable experience that can be applied to all commission-eligible products. I dialed in on interactions.

Essential product-page spec for commission, samples, and adding to Showcase
Multi-option product-page spec for variants and Showcase actions

Creator Product Detail Page

The new bottom sheet design ensures that creator-essential information and controls can be accessed easily. Most importantly, it's available directly from the TikTok Shop, increasing exposure and conversion.

+200%

Conversion

+2.5%

Added products to showcase

+10%

Videos created

Showcase management

A creator’s curated storefront

The Showcase is essentially a creator’s curated storefront, where followers can discover and purchase products they recommend. Because it represents what creators choose to promote to their audience, managing the Showcase effectively is a critical part of the creator experience.

Current Showcase settings, catalog, and manage-products screens

In a survey of 3,924 creators, two of the most common pain points centered around managing and curating their Showcase:

I cannot customize showcase 15.2%
I need showcase to display more information about products I’m promoting 15.2%
I have no idea how much income I have received 14.0%
It is hard to find and add products to showcase 13.8%
It is hard to remove products from my showcase 11.8%
Other 30.0%

Qualitative feedback reinforced these findings, particularly around the effort required to manage large catalogs and keep products up to date:

“I always have to scroll through my entire catalog to find products that are in stock.”
“Make it easier to remove out-of-stock items from my Showcase.”

Experience goals

After evaluating user needs it was clear that managing a Showcase should be more than viewing a list of products they added. We should facilitate discovery and management of their Showcase.

  1. Make curation effortless

    Enable creators to quickly add, remove, organize, and manage products in their Showcase.

  2. Surface what matters most

    Prioritize the product information creators need to make decisions, such as availability, performance, and commission.

  3. Make key actions immediately accessible

    Bring high-frequency management actions closer to the products they affect, reducing unnecessary navigation and effort.

Goal 1: make curation effortless with search, filters, and direct reordering
Goal 2: surface the product information creators need to decide
Goal 3: keep high-frequency management actions next to each product
Managing a product and finding similar products from Showcase

A connected flow from personal Showcase to publication

  1. 1

    Discover

    View personal Showcase and provide an affordance to manage.

  2. 2

    Add products

    Surface Product Marketplace and allow for easy discovery and adding.

  3. 3

    Manage products

    Delete, find similar products, and view information about the product.

  4. 4

    Preview Showcase

    See how your Showcase is looking before publishing.

When getting to the final details of this new Showcase management UX, we took a pivot: previewing Showcase is duplicative of what their profile already shows. The architecture benefited from prioritizing Product Marketplace and the Manage Products view.

New showcase management

Bridge the gap between discovery and showcase management in one seamless UX.

Impact

Bringing product evaluation and Showcase management into TikTok Shop lifted creator conversion and GMV, and the work was recognized internally.

200%

Conversion

42%

GMV

2.5%

Added products to showcase

10%

Videos created

20%

Creators come from Shop tab

🏆 Innovation award Q1 ’24

🏆 Long-term value award Q3/Q4 ’23