TikTok, Facebook are outselling traditional retail channels: businesses

Speaking at a conference on March 16 Trang Le, CEO of media firm MultiMedia, said her company thrived even during the Covid-19 pandemic by producing content on Facebook and TikTok.

Television was previously the firm’s main channel for attracting viewers and production costs were high, she said.

With the recent emergence of Facebook and TikTok, her company has been creating content and attracting millions of users at a lower cost.

It has also been able to find more sponsors, both domestically and internationally, she said.

A well-known TikTok channel, Quyen Leo Daily, managed to bring in thousands of orders totally worth VND75 billion (US$3 million) in just 13 hours of live-streaming earlier this month, which is on a par with a supermarket chain with thousands of stores, she said.

Similarly, fashion brand Canifa received 13,000 orders following a five-hour live stream hosted by Pham Thoai, another TikToker, she said.

“I have never seen any traditional retailer sell out the entire inventory in just half a day.”

These successes have led many businesses to turn to TikTok live sales.

Pham Van Viet, CEO of garment firm VitaJean, said his company’s sales have tripled ever since it established a TikTok channel last year.

The channel also helped the brand’s presence in the domestic market, he added.

Dairy giant Vinamilk, which has thousands of stores across the country, has been experimenting with selling through TikTok.

TikTok is an efficient retail channel capable of generating billion-dong sales in a short period without incurring retail space rental costs, she said.

Sellers only need to pay a small fee to the platform and the host of the live stream.

Though the platform was still in the experimental stage just two years ago, it has now become a sales channel attracting millions of users globally and an indispensable part of advertising campaigns, she added.

Concurring with Trang, Vu Kim Hanh, chairwoman of the Business Association of High-Quality Vietnamese Products, said consumers prefer buying through TikTok live streams because they can easily see and inquire about the actual products.

She admitted she too did not have a good impression of the platform at first but now finds it an attractive retail channel.

A recent survey by her association found that TikTok has helped many people “change their lives” thanks to the massive sales it brings even during economic downturns.

With over 70 million internet users, Vietnam is among the countries with a large digital population.

In recent years it has witnessed remarkable growth in e-commerce and online sales.

Consequently collaboration between e-commerce platforms and social media channels such as Facebook, TikTok and Instagram has proven to yield explosive sales.

In 2023 the top five e-commerce platforms, Shopee, Lazada, Tiki, TikTok Shop, and Sendo, generated a combined VND232.1 trillion in sales, up 53.4% from the previous year, according to data tracker Metric.

Vietnam has the highest e-commerce growth rate in Southeast Asia.

Source: VnExpress International