Sephora joins TikTok Shop as social media shapes beauty shopping

Sephora will debut on TikTok Shop in the US with a shopping experience called the Sephora Drop Shop, where users can discover and buy curated products without leaving the app. The move comes amid the growing trend of beauty consumers using social media platforms as direct shopping destinations. 

The Sephora Drop Shop will feature exclusive monthly product releases from some of the retailer’s brand partners. Each drop will be a multi-day event with media assets like teasers, interactive content, and videos led by content creators.

As part of the build-up to new drops, Sephora will also host TikTok Live events with celebrities, brand founders, and influencers who will host Q&A sessions. Viewers will be able to purchase items in real time during the broadcast.

Sephora says the move is a natural response to how beauty discovery has changed in the past few years, and allows the company to meet consumers where they now are.

“Beauty discovery has always been core to Sephora’s ethos, and the rise of social commerce and digital marketplaces has reinforced the need to evolve how we engage with our beauty lovers,” says Artemis Patrick, president and CEO of Sephora North America.

According to Sephora, beauty is the most-searched category on TikTok, garnering over a billion related searches every month.

Patrick says the company already has an active beauty community on the short-form video content app. He believes launching a pilot shop gives the company a new way to interact with its existing customers, while extending the brand’s reach to a “highly immersed” beauty audience.

Bianca Sing, global head of Strategic Brand Partnerships at TikTok Shop, says the launch combines Sephora’s beauty curation expertise with TikTok’s ability to connect communities.

Sephora is bringing its curated beauty shopping experience to TikTok users in the US.“We’re creating a new, more engaging journey from discovery to purchase, by reimagining how beauty lovers experience and shop their favorite brands,” Sing says.

Social media commerce surges

Sephora’s debut on TikTok Shop marks another major US beauty retailer entering the social media e-commerce space. Earlier this year, Ulta Beauty also announced it would hit the app’s virtual shelves.

At the time, Ulta management held that the virtual shop marks the end of siloed channel retail strategies and that it presents a watershed moment for the personal care industry.

Across the board, many beauty leaders have adapted their business strategies to tap into the growing audience of cosmetics consumers on social media.

Legacy conglomerate Unilever, for example, announced a complete overhaul of its heritage brands’ positioning. The FMCG giant is revamping and premiumizing its household names one by one in an effort to capture younger audiences’ attention and spark “desire.”

One of its recent moves saw Vaseline launch a line of lip glosses designed specifically to look good on TikTok videos.

Sephora says that launching on TikTok Shop is an extension of the company’s global digital strategy.

“By approaching this launch with a test-and-learn mindset, we are not only scaling our retailtainment model in the US, but also gathering critical insights to inform our digital innovation and future rollout across our global network,” says Anca Marola, global chief digital officer at Sephora.