Amazon Expands In-App Shopping with Meta and Snapchat Partnership

Joining the ranks of Meta, Snapchat, and Pinterest, Amazon is now joining forces with TikTok to allow US-based customers to purchase products directly from the app without having to leave the social platform.

This expansion of Amazon’s partnership to TikTok continues to confirm the importance and emphasis on the rise of social commerce for brands.  

A Seamless Shopping Experience: Amazon x TikTok

Users can link their Amazon accounts in their TikTok app to shop directly from the ads without needing to leave the apps, eliminating friction within the consumer shopping experience.

How The Amazon x TikTok Partnership Works for Users

• Shoppers receive Amazon product recommendations in their “For You” or #fyp feed.
• Upon purchase, users are prompted to link their TikTok and Amazon accounts.
• After their accounts are linked, Amazon customers can seamlessly complete their checkout with Amazon in the product add.
• Once accounts are linked, users will be able to see real-time pricing and receive the perks of their Amazon membership without leaving the TikTok app.
• Users are able to unlink the two accounts at any time if they choose.

What Does the Amazon TikTok Partnership Mean for Advertisers?

According to GWI, nearly half (48%) of consumers use social media for brand & product discovery – if Amazon users can easily check out in TikTok while still receiving the benefits from their membership, this partnership will continue to extend the ability for brands to have a more holistic marketing funnel, connecting the dots between social and shopping platforms, creating a more omni-channel shopping experience for customers.

If you are a brand who supports Amazon through paid social advertising, this partnership should open up your ability to optimize toward Amazon sales from key drivers of demand like Meta and TikTok. Features historically known for only being able to support DTC websites like Advantage+ and sales conversion campaigns in these platforms will now have a more closed loop experience and be able to optimize toward sales on Amazon.

Blue Wheel’s VP of Brand Strategy, Nick Bond, provides his take on this partnership, “This is going to be a massive change in the way advertisers prioritize their budgets and traffic to drive sales. This will open up a lot of high conversion rate tactics for social commerce and Amazon through paid social advertising.”

Additionally, Nick suggests the ability to track purchases within these platforms may provide brands with additional tactics to better position themselves to their target audiences, “What I am expecting from this partnership is event tracking and sale attribution transparency between TikTok and Amazon, as we have seen the Alpha test with Amazon & Meta.”

We expect brands with a heavy Amazon presence will push toward moving most of their business to Amazon, particularly brands with a weaker conversion rate and low sales volume on their owned and operated websites.

Brands supporting Amazon with more traditional tactics like just driving traffic through a CPC campaign will want to leverage sales conversion campaigns to increase conversions.

Finally, brands with non-Amazon retail presence will need to figure out a good balance of supporting Amazon through this, owning their own first-party data through their owned & operated website, and supporting their retail partners to their sales distribution targets on those channels.

What's Next for Social Commerce?

The parting thought here is, where does this leave social commerce shops?

You do not own the customer data on social commerce like you do through DTC websites and the conversion rate on shops is still not higher than Amazon. Given the option of where to balance your budgets between the three channels, we imagine some brands will be hyper-focused on exactly how social commerce shops play a role in their business.

If you are wondering how this might impact your overall omni-channel business strategy, this is something we work with brands on a daily basis to solve. Reach out to the team or schedule a consultation.

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