Much like a magic crystal ball, it assertively answers the question “What should I watch?” with an astonishingly diverse range of content and sounds, encouraging creativity and consumer needs – a recommendation engine that curates content just for you. 

You probably took your breaks between Zoom meetings or online classes learning the infamous Renegade dance challenge and duetting with a fellow user. Or perhaps you pinned several clips of do-it-yourself craft hacks for your grandma that eased your daily task, reflecting, “We don’t have to go to great lengths to make things work, I could simply use what I have, and all the shortcuts are visually here.”

TikTok has also become a transformative space, giving a voice to the voiceless. A community was created for many aspiring women entrepreneurs – especially the Indonesian community; a springboard to dreams, success, and proven capability. Like a calling from the universe, as Shant Oknayan shared with The Jakarta Post on Wednesday, Head of Global Business Solutions - Asia-Pacific, Middle East, Africa & Central Asia, TikTok, was moved with a similar purpose.

"On TikTok, everybody can lean in and have a voice and they are accepted for who they are, and to me, that is what TikTok represents. Our mission has remained unchanged since we began, and we’ve come a long way. Now we inspire creativity in and bring joy to 325 million people on TikTok every month in Southeast Asia, and 125 million in Indonesia," said Shant.

Recently, TikTok organized its regional event, TikTok Shoppertainment Summit 2023, in Jakarta, Indonesia. The event itself aims to reiterate TikTok's focus on being the platform where content and commerce converge to support businesses of all sizes to thrive and tap into the USD 1 Trillion opportunity in the APAC region. 

During his keynote session, Shant shared about 'shoppertainment', a portmanteau of “shopping” and “entertainment”. The concept is the result of shifting consumer behavior and convergence of content and commerce, where one in three consumers desires commerce that combines entertainment and education [1]  because, “The audience wants to be interacted with, not spoken to,” Shant noted. 

This audience behaviour gives a peek at how the future of consumers will be, as presented by Mohammed Sirajuddeen, Managing Director, Growth & Transformation Lead, Accenture Song. Siraj presented three types of future consumers: the Mirrored consumers who like to follow the trend, the Curators who give honest reviews and curation, and the Collectives who prefer to join the crowd and buy in groups.

Sitaresti Astarini, Head of Business Marketing, TikTok Indonesia, continued the session and highlighted how the integrated and seamless journey from discovery to purchase is facilitated by the convergence of content and commerce. This can be seen from the report that 70% [2] of TikTok users in Indonesia want to shop in TikTok in 2023 due to the seamless experience. Additionally, TikTok provided insights to brands on effectively utilizing Shoppertainment during the upcoming Mega Sales season, as 59% of TikTok users in the country are looking for deals and discounts during Mega Sales.

Today, the platform spotlights close to 2 million Indonesian sellers on TikTok Shop out of the 125 million Indonesian TikTok users – and there will be more.

“You see that there is a real hunger and hustle to just get things done, to move ahead and to grow,” Shant told the Post regarding the company’s choice to visit the country. “It seems like there is a real appetite from Indonesia in terms of what TikTok could offer both for users and businesses and therefore a real curiosity from my side and the whole leadership team to say, ‘Okay, how do we lean in further and enable these success stories in Indonesia?’”

And for Shant, his trip to Indonesia validated this: the energy, the excitement that he has seen on the platform, “It’s very real, you could actually feel it.”

Shoppertainment can be an engine for growth for many businesses – from small to renowned brands; one of which is Jiniso, an apparel brand from Indonesia. Dian, the founder, shared how the brand moved from Tanah Abang market to the TikTok platform, tirelessly experimented with content and features in TikTok, and was finally able to drive 50% of its sales significantly from TikTok.

In addition to micro, small & medium enterprises (MSMEs), large enterprises are enhancing their commerce activity with TikTok. Philips, a household electronics brand familiar to many of us, is one such example. During the holiday season last year, Philips utilized TikTok Shop Ads to retarget high-intent and high-value customers across a wide range of products. As a result, Philips achieved a 4.8x higher return on ads spend (ROAS) and a 15% increase in the value per order.

TikTok is not just a place for inspiring creativity and bringing joy, but it can also produce opportunities and drive results for all.

And these are just some of the many possibilities TikTok hopes for communities and businesses to realize. Being a human-centric space, the platform has always cared from an angle that is not often seen. TikTok continues to conduct regular programs and initiatives to support local businesses to grow on the platform, starting from TikTok Shop Academy for business owners that want to enter TikTok Shop, #MajuBarengTikTok that gives free workshop classes about digital marketing and creative content, and many other. Recently, TikTok also announced that they will invest USD 12.2 million to support more than 120.000 MSMEs in Southeast Asia.

It might all begin with the booming movement of #TikTokMadeMeBuyIt with 61 billion views. Now, we can foresee a potential new movement as a byproduct of TikTok granting this new reality to many, such as #IMadeItBecauseOfTikTok.

1. GWI Connecting the Dots report, 2021
2. TikTok commissioned study on consumer behaviour during Mega Sales conducted by Toluna among n=824 TikTok users and non-users in ID, 2023

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