Category: How To’s

If you’ve been hearing a lot about TikTok Shop lately and wondering whether it’s actually worth your time…

Spoiler – it is. And if you’re a beauty brand that isn’t thinking about it right now, you’re already playing catch-up.

The audience is huge and it’s no longer just younger demographics, in the UK, over one million shoppers now buy beauty directly through TikTok- representing 4.2% of the population and that number is climbing. Beauty and personal care products were TikTok Shop’s top sellers in the last few years, with over 370 million units sold worldwide.

This isn’t a passing trend or channel. It’s a fundamental shift in how beauty consumers discover and buy products, and if you don’t already, your brand needs a strategy for it now. This blog covers what TikTok Shop is, how it works and how to promote your products on it.

So, what actually is TikTok shop?

TikTok Shop is TikTok’s in-app commerce feature.

It lets brands list products directly on the platform so users can browse, tap, and buy without ever leaving the app. At just over a year old, it has already grown to be a more popular retail channel than the likes of Shein, Sephora, and home shopping TV.

For beauty brands, this is significant. Your audience is already on TikTok watching skincare routines, makeup tutorials, and product hauls. The commercial opportunity is huge as TikTok Shop closes the gap between watching and buying.

There are three main ways beauty brands can sell through TikTok Shop, and they are:

• Shoppable videos: Products are tagged in your content so viewers can tap and buy directly from the video
• Live shopping: You or a creator hosts a live broadcast, demoing products and driving purchases in real time
• A branded storefront: Your own product catalogue lives on TikTok, discoverable through search and browse

Instead of static listings or generic ads, TikTok Shop blends real-time selling with storytelling by creating an experience that feels less like a transaction and more like a conversation, replicating the in-store, in-person experience. That’s what makes it so powerful for beauty.

How do you promote products on TikTok shop?

This is where a lot of brands go wrong, treating TikTok Shop like a passive sales channel and waiting for the algorithm to do the heavy lifting. But it doesn’t work like that. Active, paid promotion is what drives results.

Affiliate creators are your engine

The most effective driver of TikTok Shop sales for beauty brands isn’t actually your own content; it’s other people’s. TikTok’s affiliate programme lets you connect with creators who promote your products in exchange for commission on sales. Nearly 45% of TikTok consumers are influenced by paid creator content when making purchasing decisions.

The smartest approach is to build a roster of creators across different sizes and audiences, focusing not just the big names.

Micro-creators with smaller but highly engaged audiences can often drive stronger conversion because their followers genuinely trust their recommendations. Give them product to trial, brief them on any key messages, and let them be authentic. Overly-scripted content is obvious and flops on TikTok every time.

UK brand Made by Mitchell is a brilliant example of this done right. They built momentum through consistent creator activity and daily livestreams before setting a UK record with a 12-hour live event during the Summer Sale, generating over £800,000 in a single broadcast.

Live shopping is where the real numbers happen

At its core, TikTok Shop is about discovery commerce and an increasing amount of that is happening through live selling. Think of it as QVC for the TikTok generation: a host demos the product, answers questions in real time, and drives immediate purchases through limited-time offers and exclusive drops.

The UK results speak for themselves. PLouise, one of the UK’s leading TikTok Shop beauty sellers, generated over £1.6 million in just 12 hours during a single live shopping event. You don’t need to hit those numbers straight away, but you do need to show up consistently and back it with proper investment.

You might be wondering, what is the right investment? Well, this depends on the size and ambitions of your brand, how much brand awareness your brand already has and whether you’re looking to test the platform or scale up. We can help you determine what strategy and level of investment would be right for your brand.

Your product listings need work too

Before any promotion lands, your listings need to be pulling their weight. TikTok has its own search algorithm, and your product titles, descriptions, and keywords all need to be optimised for how beauty shoppers actually search on the platform.

Our key principles for strong listings:

• Lead with the benefit in your product title – what does it do, not just what is it
• Use relevant search terms or keywords in your descriptions (think: how would your customer type this into TikTok?)
• Use high-quality video content alongside product images – static images alone underperform
• Show the product in use, not just on a white background – lifestyle content converts better

TikTok’s own seller guidance on listing optimisation for discoverability is a useful starting point if you want to go deeper on the technical side.

TikTok shop is not organic social

This is the most important thing to understand before you invest in TikTok Shop and it catches a lot of marketing managers out.

TikTok the app is a social platform. TikTok Shop is a commerce channel.

They overlap but they’re not the same thing and don’t run on the same logic. Organic social is about building community, brand awareness, and long-term engagement. It’s valuable, but on its own it won’t drive enough conversions to make a meaningful commercial impact. whereas TikTok Shop can.

TikTok Shop performance is driven by paid activity:

TikTok shopping ads specifically Video Shopping Ads and LIVE Shopping Ads are designed to drive direct traffic to your Shop

Paid creator partnerships is paying affiliates commission (or upfront fees) and is a paid media investment, not an organic strategy

Promoted live events is done by boosting your live shopping sessions with ad spend dramatically increases reach and, in turn, conversion

The practical implication is this: TikTok Shop needs a budget, a media plan, and clear performance metrics – not just a good content calendar. If your TikTok Shop strategy currently lives in your organic social team’s remit, it is almost certainly underserving its potential.

TikTok’s own guidance on launching your TikTok Shop journey covers the ad formats available and how to structure your approach which is worth reading before you brief anyone on execution.

What a solid TikTok shop strategy actually looks like

You don’t need to go all-in from day one. A phased approach works well for most beauty brands:

1) Get your foundations right: Optimised listings, a clear product selection for Shop, and your affiliate programme set up

2) Start with creator affiliates: Find 10–20 creators who genuinely fit your brand and let them drive early sales and content. This is something we do well as an agency.

3) Test live shopping: Start with one hosted live event per month, measure carefully, and scale what works

4) Layer in paid media: Once you know what converts, then you can put budget behind it

If you’re a beauty brand, especially skincare for the before-and-after content format that TikTok’s audience loves, then TikTok Shop is one of the most powerful conversion tools available to you right now. The opportunity is real, the question is whether you have the right strategy and support to capture it.

If you you’re looking for the right partner to support you, chat with our team of experts today.

Launching a new brand or product into the UK can be both exciting and daunting, but by having the right strategy in place, you can ensure you’re maximising the impact of your launch into a new market.

By the time you’re ready to launch a new brand or product, you should know your audience really well and be confident that your new product range is going to speak to their needs. There is so much to consider when creating a launch plan, for example, what channels should yuu focus on, how much should you spend on ads or agency support, what type of launch strategy should you run on our website?

Launching into the UK market also requires an understanding of how UK consumers discover products online. For many brands entering the UK for the first time, brand awareness will be naturally low, meaning discovery often happens through non-branded searches, social media, and retail platforms before customers ever search directly for your brand.

It’s also important to understand that UK search results are often heavily influenced by large retailers and publications. Sites such as Boots, Sephora and beauty publications frequently dominate search results, meaning brands need to think strategically about how they will gain visibility alongside these established players.

At Foundation, our launch strategies follow these key phases:

• Optimise website
• Build awareness
• Generate hype
• Demonstrate social proof
• Drive sales

In this article, we are going to be sharing some top tips to consider when launching a new brand or product.

What to consider when launching a brand in the UK

1. Make sure your website is ready to convert

Before thinking about your acquisition strategy, it’s imperative that your website is set up to drive conversions, so getting your website prepared for the launch is an important first step. Ensuring you have category and product pages that are well optimised for both SEO and for the customer, demonstrating signs of social proof, and most importantly, full of all the relevant information your customer might need to purchase the product. Consider things like FAQs, high quality video content that demonstrates the product live in action, user generated content and make sure your e-commerce best practice elements are in place (e.g. trust signals, frictionless checkouts, displaying delivery information etc.).

If you are launching into the UK market specifically, it’s also important to ensure your website reflects local expectations. This includes clearly displaying delivery timelines within the UK, transparent returns policies, pricing in GBP, and clear information around duties or shipping if you are operating internationally. Small details like this can make a big difference in building trust with new UK customers who may be discovering your brand for the first time.

2. Decide on a launch strategy

One of the first decisions you’ll want to make is whether to build a waiting list or launch directly to your audience. Each approach has its benefits and challenges:

Waiting list strategy

By asking customers to register their interest by joining a waiting list, you are building up a valuable pool of interested customers before your product goes live. These people have indicated that they have an interest in your brand and product, giving valuable insight into the potential popularity of the launch.

Benefits: This strategy is beneficial as it allows you to nurture potential customers through emails and content, turning them into warm prospects. It’s particularly good for products that require a bit more education or explanation, as this gives you the forum to do so. It also helps create hype and excitement around the launch.

Challenges: The risks around this approach is that it requires momentum. We don’t want the lead time to be too long and risk customers losing interest, so think about your launch date and plan backwards from there. It also requires a compelling incentive to encourage those sign ups. You could consider things like offering early access or “pre-sale” or even giving an introductory offer or gift with purchase.

Direct-to-sale strategy

Launching directly to your audience without requiring them to join a waitlist can work well for certain types of products, particularly those that require less consideration or are considered more of an “impulse” buy, as we want customers to make purchasing decisions in the moment. By elongating that process with a waiting list, we could risk deterring customers.

Benefits: This approach reduces friction by encouraging immediate purchases. It’s also ideal for brands with established audiences, loyal customers and a ready-made pool of warm customers.

Challenges: Launching direct to sale requires strong pre-launch awareness and a clear call to action.

Regardless of your launch strategy, the pre-launch phase is critical for success. Here’s what to focus on:

Compelling content

• Use video content to highlight the story behind your product, demonstrate how it works, and address key benefits.
• Incorporate founder-generated content or testimonials to build trust and relatability.
• Share this content across your organic social channels and in ads.

Leverage social proof

• Send your product to UK based micro-creators or existing customers for reviews and content generation.
• Utilise the “herd effect” by coordinating multiple creators to post about your product in a short time frame. The idea here is to flood the algorithms with user generated content to reach a colder audience. Ideally this should happen no more than 2-3 weeks before launch to avoid fatigue, ensuring you are only selecting influencers and creators that resonate with the brand values and tone of voice.

Awareness-focussed ads

• Create ads that demonstrate product benefits and show authentic testimonials. Use retargeting to keep your product top of mind for those who have interacted with your content.

For brands launching into the UK, creators and influencers can play an especially important role in building early awareness. Platforms such as TikTok and Instagram are increasingly where UK consumers discover new brands and products, meaning creator content can often generate initial demand before branded search volume even exists.

4. Leverage your existing audience through effective email marketing

If you already have a community of email subscribers, it makes sense to nurture that community as they have already indicated an interest in your brand. A well-structured email sequence can nurture leads and drive conversions. Consider the following elements in your launch email campaigns:

• Problem: Highlight the challenges your product solves.
• Transformation: Show how your product creates positive change.
• Proof: Share reviews, testimonials, or your own story to build trust.
• Anticipate why customers might hesitate to buy and address those concerns in your emails.
• Using countdowns can be effective in generating excitement in the days leading up to your launch.

5. Leverage your existing community through organic social media

Your social channels should act as a “mini-website” for your product, answering key questions and building excitement. Your social content should inspire, inform and entertain your audience. When creating a social content strategy, think about your sub-topics and ensure you have a healthy mix of:

• Top of funnel content such as founder stories, lifestyle content
• Mid-funnel content such as tutorials, how-to guides, explainers, and
• Bottom-funnel content such as products in action, offers, promotions, as well as
• Authentic user generated content, customer testimonials, reviews and content of the products in action, to demonstrate social proof.

If you are entering the UK market for the first time, social media can also be a powerful tool for building early brand familiarity. By collaborating with UK-based creators and showcasing local voices within your content, you can help your brand feel more relevant and credible to a new audience.

6. Launch day!

Once your product is live:

• Send a launch announcement emails to your list and announce the launch across your social channels.
• Switch your ads to promote the live offer, emphasising urgency or scarcity (e.g., limited stock or time-sensitive deals).
• Write and distribute a press release tailored to the UK market, ensuring it’s newsworthy, well-targeted, and aligned with current media trends to help maximise its chances of being picked up by industry publications

7. Post-launch

Now that your product is live and customers are receiving it, you can get real-time customer feedback. This is an opportunity to leverage social proof even more and user generated content even more. Consider things like:

• Encouraging reviews on your product pages (potentially with an incentive)
• Incentivising content sharing through competitions

For brands launching into the UK market, the period immediately after launch is also an opportunity to monitor how demand is developing. Looking at metrics such as non-branded search growth, brand search volume, and engagement across social platforms can help you understand how awareness is building and where to focus your marketing investment next.

Get in touch to see how Foundation can help you launch, scale, and stand out in the UK beauty market today.