Inside influencer storefronts and how they're driving sales for brands

Last week, Amazon held its first-ever “Prime Early Access” sale, essentially an equivalent to the company’s annual “Prime Day” event, but with an added holiday shopping slant. During the sale’s 48-hour span, influencers flooded TikTok and other social media platforms with videos promoting specific products and major discounts; and social media users accordingly flocked to these videos. On TikTok alone, the hashtag #PrimeEarlyAccessSale was viewed over 24 million times in just two days. “[W]atched this and immediately bought the leggings,” one user commented on creator @laurenwolfe’s TikTok video about products included in the sale. “Please stop I just bought the green dress,” another user posted on a video from creator @conqueringasya_ that listed on-sale clothing items. Across almost all of these videos, there was one common factor—a prompting from the influencer for their followers to visit their “Amazon storefront,” available at a link posted in their TikTok bio, to view the specific products recommended in their videos in one centralized space. These “storefronts” aren’t new, but events such as Amazon’s latest sale emphasize creators’ expanding role in driving consumers’ purchasing decisions. Over the past two years, a growing number of influencers have turned to platforms such as Amazon and the creator-oriented shopping app LTK, which each offer influencers customizable “storefronts” to consolidate product recommendations from dozens of different brands, as major sources of income. Creators share links to these storefronts in their social media bios, encouraging their followers to visit their storefronts and purchase the clothing, jewelry or other products featured in their content— because when one of their followers makes a purchase from these curated collections of products, influencers get a cut of the money involved in that transaction. And with the meteoric rise of hashtags like “TikTokMadeMeBuyIt,” which currently has over 25 billion views on TikTok, it’s clear that this relationship between influencers and their followers is symbiotic, with consumers increasingly looking to influencer recommendations when making a purchase. Ad Age Next: Streaming Get your tickets for the Nov. 10 event in New York and use the code AA50 for $50 off Register here This sense of trust and connection consumers feel toward their favorite creators underlies the growing authority they assign to these influencers when deciding to buy something. Consumers, especially younger ones, are no longer deceived by hollow product endorsements from celebrities or overt brand messaging, said Mary Williams, head of creator success and marketing at the influencer-oriented shopping app LTK. Influencer recommendations, on the other hand, come across as something closer to a suggestion from a friend—even when a brand is paying the creator to promote that recommended item, she said. “We’re going to get paid ads and social ads all day long. But, as shoppers, we’re pretty clear now on what those are,” Williams said. “When you’re purchasing something because you got a recommendation from someone you trust—whether that was a friend or an influencer who you’ve been following for years—there’s just a bigger sense of commitment there. Brands really appreciate the authenticity and trust that creators are able to build, and they’re trying to capitalize on that.” Powerful influence A new survey from Ad Age and The Harris Poll of over 1,000 U.S. consumers found that nearly one in five adults have purchased a product or service based on an influencer recommendation, with 24% of respondents reporting they have bought an item through a creator’s curated lists of products on platforms like Amazon or LTK. Even if they didn’t solely rely on an influencer’s endorsement of a product when buying a product or service, 43% of respondents cited creators’ input as “influential on their final purchase decision.” Over 20% reported “frequently” turning to influencers for insight into a given product or service before buying it. Almost one in 10 consumers said they “always” sought a creator’s input into a product before making a purchase. These numbers jump significantly among younger consumers: 75% of respondents between ages 18 and 25 said recommendations from influencers impact their decision to make a purchase, while only 40% of respondents aged 42 to 57, and 18% of those between ages 58 and 72, reported the same. Additionally, 40% of 18-to-25-year-old consumers have made these purchases directly through an influencer’s Amazon storefront or LTK shop, dropping to just 18% among 42-to-57-year-old respondents and 16% for those aged 58 to 76. The social media platforms on which consumers search for influencer recommendations also vary between age brackets: 73% of consumers aged 18 to 25 reported looking to TikTok creators for their input on a product, with Instagram and YouTube influencers also popular sources for these recommendations. Older consumers tended to favor YouTube and Facebook for creator input. Among all consumers, product reviews were cited more frequently than influencers as impacting their purchase decisions; 80% of consumers reported their purchases being influenced by reviews, compared to 43% of those who said creator recommendations shaped their decisions. However, these sources hold nearly equal weight among Gen Z consumers, with 75% saying they seek out influencer input and 80% turning to user reviews. In other words, for Gen Z, influencer recommendations are the new product reviews. Amazon embraces influencers “Have you ever wondered why your favorite influencers are always directing you to their Amazon storefront instead of just telling you the name of the product so you can look it up yourself?” Claire Wenrick, an influencer who goes by @claireliz_ on social media, asked her followers in a June TikTok video. “It’s because your favorite creators are making insane amounts of money by directing you to their Amazon storefronts.” Across just the first eight days of October, Wenrick earned over $1,800 just by recommending clothing and beauty products available on Amazon to her followers. Much of Wenrick’s Instagram content is designed to model these products to her 41,600 followers on the platform, from a Reel of Wenrick spinning in a white lace dress on a brick New York street to her recent “hot girl Halloween costume” series, cross-posted on TikTok, in which she assembles costumes from clothing and accessories available on Amazon. In almost all of these posts, Wenrick encourages her followers to visit her Amazon storefront, where she lists hundreds of products sorted into different categories like “fall fashion” and “beauty favs.” Amazon first introduced storefronts for influencers in 2017 as part of the company’s broader influencer program. To qualify for this program, a creator needs to have an existing social media presence on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook or TikTok, and Amazon will take into consideration a creator’s “content, engagement rate and following size” when deciding whether to allow them to join the program, Meredith Silver, director of creator growth at Amazon, said in an email. Silver declined to provide information about the number of influencers currently involved in the program. Creators can earn a commission rate of anywhere from 1% to 20% on sales originating from their storefront, depending on the product categories of the purchased items. Purchases of clothing and jewelry net influencers 4% of the total purchase value, while makeup, skincare and items for the home offer a 3% commission rate. Creators qualify for these earnings even if their followers didn’t buy an item listed on their storefront; the program includes a “halo effect” that rewards influencers for any purchase a consumer makes after being directed to Amazon through an influencer’s unique storefront link, Silver said. Wenrick made her Amazon storefront in March 2020, almost in tandem with the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. After initially joining the student ambassador program for Amazon Prime, the company began urging her to create a storefront, partially to promote the influencer program, she said. At first, she made few sales through her storefront—but when a TikTok video of her simply scrolling through a list of home decor items on her storefront earned her $200, she realized “there was actually money to be made here” and made content creation her full-time career. A post shared by claire (@claireliz_) “I noticed that when I started posting Instagram Reels, those started performing super well,” she said. “I was getting a million views on each Reel whenever I would talk about Amazon—it wasn’t my other videos, it was only the Amazon ones. That was creating a ton of conversions, and then people started asking about [my storefront].” Wenrick currently earns anywhere from $1,000 to nearly $6,000 per month from her Amazon storefront depending on promotional events or holidays in a given month, she said. For example, she racked up over $5,000 this past July due to Amazon’s “Prime Day” sales event, and she typically sees a boost in commissions around Black Friday and holidays like Halloween or Christmas. These commissions comprise 90% of her overall income, with the remaining amount coming from brand deals and educational materials she offers to other people looking to become full-time influencers. The #AmazonStorefront hashtag has over 276 million views on TikTok; since the start of 2022, the number of people searching for influencer storefronts has surged. This interest peaked during July, corresponding with Prime Day. A ‘three-sided marketplace’ LTK—formerly known as rewardStyle and LIKEtoKNOW.it before rebranding last year—revolves around influencer recommendations and enables consumers to browse influencer-curated collections of products known as “shops.” The creator-oriented shopping app was the brainchild of co-founder Amber Venz Box, a creator herself who sought to monetize her fashion blog content back in 2010. Like Amazon’s influencer program, creators receive a cut of the sales their shops drive on the platform, with brands individually determining their commission rates. And, similar to Amazon’s halo effect, these commissions are based on the price of the entire order that included an item from the creator’s shop, not just that specific item, “because it’s their traffic, their loyal follower,” said LTK’s Williams. Over 200,000 influencers use LTK, according to the company. The platform functions as a “three-sided marketplace,” bringing together creators, brands and consumers—allowing brands to directly partner with influencers to promote clothing, skincare products and other items to shoppers looking to creators for product recommendations, Williams said. “The intent is mutual success for all three,” she said. “Brands have a really personal, organic way of reaching their shoppers; shoppers get the stuff they want from people who look and feel and shop like them; and creators earn for sharing all of those products and brands.” Some creators add new products to their shops daily, Williams said. Jen Adams, also known as @interiordesignerella, is one of them. Since joining LTK in 2016, the commissions she earns through her 619,000-follower shop have formed the “backbone” of Adams’s full-time influencer career, she said. Adams has oriented her entire social media presence around driving followers to her LTK shop, hiring a team of nine people to help create photo collages of clothing and accessories available on her shop and short videos of Adams modeling many of these items. Along with a direct link to her LTK shop in her Instagram bio, almost all of her posts also include the link in their descriptions. Through LTK, Adams has also entered into deals with brands like Express, Nordstrom and Walmart to feature some of their products on her LTK shop and her social media channels. The platform works directly with brands to coordinate partnerships between brands and creators, providing a “self service platform” that gathers information about various creators open to brand collaborations for companies seeking creators for a campaign. Adams has received several offers from brands through that portal and has been able to review contracts and other details about potential collaborations directly through the LTK platform, she said. A post shared by Jen Adams (@interiordesignerella) Since LTK’s founding in 2010, brands have invested over $1.8 billion into these creator deals, according to a recent press release. The skincare brand Elemis, for example, tapped LTK creators as brand ambassadors in a campaign to boost brand awareness, which reached almost three million consumers across LTK, YouTube and Instagram. Wenrick said she, too, receives offers from brands, with many asking her to test one of their products and feature it on her storefront if she likes it. Although she has agreed to add a few beauty products to her recommended products after getting these messages, the pay is typically “super low” or simply a gifted item from the brand, she said. Amazon also lacks a centralized platform for brands to connect directly with creators and their storefronts. Though Adams also has an Amazon storefront, she primarily directs her followers to her LTK shop when showing off different products in order to keep all of her recommendations housed in a single place. “It makes total sense that, as creators, we offer a one-stop shop for our followers,” she said. “And for me, personally, that is my target market. I know every creator runs their business a little bit differently, but my followers are shoppers. If you look at my Instagram and my LTK [shop], it’s all just about deals—what the sales are.” Ad Age Next: CMO Get your tickets for the Dec. 7 event in New York Register here New product reviews When the pandemic drove U.S. consumers into lockdown and shuttered brick and mortar businesses, online shopping soared—and, with in-person shopping difficult or impossible, consumers became increasingly reliant on product reviews. Recommendations from influencers are, effectively, reviews enhanced beyond a simple rating from one to five stars, with many creators sharing detailed videos showing a product from different angles or even using it themselves, Williams explained. “The more you can get an authentic review of a product, or real information about [its] fit or quality or how to style it, it just sort of [takes] the guesswork out of shopping,” she said. “We all want to buy things that meet the criteria that we personally have, whether that's quality or better value. And there are influencers at all price points.” “Whether you follow people who have a similar lifestyle or a similar body shape to you, or who are more aspirational, you’re building a sort of relationship and sense of trust,” she added. “So, when you want to purchase something, you’re able to get details from them you simply couldn’t get directly from a brand.” LTK recently revealed that the number of creators the company works with has nearly tripled across the past three years. Brands are buying in, too, with companies putting $800 million into influencer deals on LTK in the past year alone. As more consumers seek out creators when buying products, brands are realizing the value these creator reviews have in increasing consumers’ trust in and satisfaction with a given item, as influencers can share extensive information about a product, such as if a piece of clothing runs big or how a pair of shoes can be incorporated into an outfit, Williams said. Some consumers have taken it a step further and directly messaged Wenrick to ask her to buy a specific dress or pair of pants so they can see what it looks like on an ordinary person, rather than a staged photo of a model on a brand’s website, before they buy it for themselves, she said. Whether on TikTok or Instagram, her video content in which she models clothing or accessories earns her the most commissions, she said. Often, Adams’s followers are “shopping for a reason,” like finding a dress for a bachelorette party or a business-casual wardrobe for a new job, she said. Adams frequently receives messages from her followers on Instagram asking for her advice about specific occasions like these—as summer wound down, teachers and students alike flocked to her DMs requesting her recommendations for back-to-school outfits. Some of her followers will message Adams with pictures of them wearing products she recommended or telling her that they received several compliments on an outfit they assembled based on Adams’s recommendation, she said. Others will even reach out to her to share their personal struggles. “There have been quite a few times where girls opened up more personally about some hard times that they’re going through, like a divorce or a death in the family; or they had a surgery and they want to feel confident; or they lost a lot of weight,” she said. “For me, it’s more than just shopping. I feel like if I can be a resource in terms of encouragement and support, in addition to a practical need that they have ... it brings me so much joy to get to do that.”

Inside influencer storefronts and how they're driving sales for brands

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