The social commerce battle: Who is winning & why

**Kerrie Lopez is the Founder & General Manager of November Collective, a boutique consultancy that helps startup and brand leaders drive growth through marketing, strategic partnerships, and e-commerce strategy. She has spent the past decade at the intersection of retail and tech, building 0→1 products and teams for companies like Instagram, Thrive Market, Jet.com and Walmart. Kerrie received her degree from Cornell University where she is also a Guest Lecturer in Applied Economics & Management.**

There’s a reason you’re seeing The Pink Stuff, Owala Freesips, and Wavytalk Thermal Brushes everywhere: social commerce.

In the rapidly evolving e-commerce landscape, the battle for social commerce supremacy is underway. Just as Meta prematurely deprecated many of its Instagram Shopping features (see: Shop Tab, Affiliate), TikTok aggressively expanded into social commerce in the US. As the next wave of social commerce innovation begins, let’s take a step back to evaluate the frontrunners and understand their potential.

*speaking on a panel about e-commerce hosted by the Category Management Association*

For those unfamiliar, social commerce is defined as the buying and selling of goods and services directly within a social media platform. People can complete the entire shopping journey within the platform, from discovery to purchase. Despite a rapidly growing social commerce market of more than $500 billion in China, consumer adoption has yet to fully catch on in the US.

I’ve been bullish about social commerce for years and joined the front lines at Instagram, where I helped develop the social media platform’s Shop Tab. My team’s remit was to build the dedicated e-commerce surface into a destination for people to discover and reengage with brands and products, much as they would via Amazon, Target or Nordstrom. Over time, our team morphed into an ads monetization squad, leveraging commerce primarily to combat the loss of data from Apple’s iOS14 privacy updates and to increase ROAS for our advertisers.

As we enter 2024, it’s evident that TikTok holds a decisive social commerce advantage, marked by the launch of innovative features like TikTok Shop, which seamlessly integrates a full-funnel shopping experience into the popular mobile app. TikTok Shop’s approachability, diverse seller mix, low product prices and frictionless shopping flow have turned it into a formidable e-commerce contender, with ambitious sale targets indicating substantial growth potential. We’ve already seen TikTok’s success in transforming obscure brands and products into viral sensations, underscoring its efficacy as a marketing powerhouse capable of reshaping consumer behavior and driving product-market fit for social commerce in the US. TikTok is even opening film studios where influencers can build sets and livestream, a model that has done well for the parent company in China. We’re watching in real time as TikTok cements its position as a leader in social commerce.

*The suite of in-app shopping touchpoints on TikTok: Live Shopping, Shoppable Video, Shop Page, and Shop Tab*

But the battle is far from over: Meta still has an opportunity to regain lost ground. Instagram Shopping, while an early pioneer of social commerce, has had a largely cautious approach to integrating shopping features into the app. By reinvesting in its shopping functionality and the overall commerce ecosystem (e.g. brands, sellers, creators), Meta can and should reclaim its position as a leader in social commerce before it’s too late. In particular, they can learn from TikTok’s UX, which takes people from content to purchase in just 3-4 clicks. We know that at least two thirds of people are discovering new products to buy on social, so making inspired/impulse purchases easy is key. Given its scale and ubiquity as a platform, Meta’s response to TikTok’s bold market entry will be critical to shaping the future of social commerce.

As TikTok races for dominance and Meta grapples with its strategy, the emergence of retail media networks (RMNs) as formidable competitors adds another layer of complexity to the social commerce landscape. RMNs' ability to leverage first-party purchase data and drive lower-funnel sales poses a significant challenge to platforms like Instagram and TikTok, who many advertisers largely still view as top-of-funnel customer acquisition drivers. As ad dollars increasingly shift toward RMNs to reach people closer to the point of purchase, the competition for brand attention and budgets intensifies.

I’m also keeping an eye on Pinterest, the apparent underdog in social commerce. Pinterest has been quietly making its content more shoppable for years. More than half of Pinterest’s 490MM monthly active users say they use the platform to shop, and their team has invested in a large, diversified product catalog to meet consumers’ needs. Pinterest considers itself a “positive corner of the internet” and Gen Z loves the unique digital safe haven that the app offers. Any apparent commercialization is countered by hyper-relevancy, allowing Pinterest Shopping efforts to increase user engagement, while TikTok and Instagram leaders worry that their own commerce features may detract from the overall app experience.

To truly win this war, these platforms will need to make the shopping experience relevant, trustworthy, and seamless—with an extremely fast path to purchase. Only time will tell which platforms will emerge as victors as the fierce social commerce battle rages on.