There’s a new rivalry in tech: Amazon versus TikTok.

科技界出現(xiàn)了一場新的競爭：亞馬遜公司對陣TikTok。

TikTok made a name for itself in the U.S. as a viral video-sharing sensation. Now it’s trying to get its 150 million U.S. users to think of it as a shopping destination.

TikTok曾因在美國掀起一場短視頻分享熱潮而名聲大噪。現(xiàn)在，該公司正試圖讓1.5億美國用戶將其視為購物目的地。

Amazon, meanwhile, is trying new tactics to maintain its dominance in e-commerce. It has added social elements to its app to entice younger shoppers, and it is building up a network of influencers who hawk items on and off its website.

與此同時，亞馬遜也在嘗試新的策略，以保持其在電商領域的主導地位。該公司在自家應用中加入了社交元素，以吸引年輕的購物者，并正在建立一個由網紅構成的網絡進行帶貨。

As a result, the two companies are on a collision course as they vie for position in a huge market. Researchers at Insider Intelligence estimate social e-commerce will grow into a $100 billion market by 2025, from $67 billion this year.

結果就是，這兩家公司在這個巨大市場爭奪地位的過程中短兵相接。Insider Intelligence的研究人員預計，到2025年，社交電商的市場規(guī)模將從今年的670億美元增長至1,000億美元。

To succeed, each company will need to copy elements of the other’s success. TikTok, owned by Beijing-based ByteDance, wants customers to trust it as a safe and reliable place to buy products, the way many already trust Amazon. And Amazon is trying to persuade users to hang out on its app like they do on social-media services.

要想取得成功，這兩家公司都需要復制對方的成功要素。作為字節(jié)跳動旗下平臺的TikTok希望用戶相信它是一個安全可靠的購物場所，就像許多人已經信任亞馬遜一樣。而亞馬遜正試圖說服其用戶像使用社交媒體服務一樣使用其應用。

TikTok launched its shopping feature, called TikTok Shop, last month and is currently selling about $7 million worth of products like hairbrushes, teeth-whitening tools and fall-themed sweatshirts with leaves and pumpkins every day in the U.S., with a goal of reaching $10 million a day by the end of the year, according to people familiar with the matter. Amazon’s global online store sales—a measure of the products Amazon sells directly—was roughly $603 million a day last year.

TikTok上個月推出了名為TikTok Shop的購物功能，知情人士透露，目前TikTok電商在美國日均銷售價值約為700萬美元的產品，如梳子、牙齒美白工具以及印有樹葉和南瓜的秋季主題運動衫，其目標是今年年底前日均銷售額達到1,000萬美元。去年，亞馬遜的全球網上商店銷售額（衡量亞馬遜直銷產品的指標）日均約6.03億美元。

TikTok is spending heavily to build a logistics operation, poaching Amazon employees and trying to lure third-party sellers by offering them a bigger cut of sales than Amazon, according to sellers. More than 60% of Amazon’s retail sales come from third-party sellers.

據賣家稱，TikTok正在斥巨資建立物流業(yè)務，挖走亞馬遜員工，并試圖通過提供比亞馬遜更大的銷售分成來吸引第三方賣家。亞馬遜超過60%的商品零售額來自第三方賣家。

“This is a big change of how people shop and so we want to make sure we’re getting it right,” said Marni Levine, a new TikTok e-commerce executive in charge of U.S. small-business operations who came from Facebook’s parent company, Meta Platforms. She declined to comment on whether TikTok sees Amazon as a competitor. An Amazon spokeswoman said social shopping “has grown tremendously over the past five years” for the e-commerce giant.

TikTok負責美國小企業(yè)業(yè)務的新任電子商務高管Marni Levine表示：“這是人們購物方式的一個重大變化，因此我們希望確保能正確應對?！盠evine此前供職于Facebook母公司Meta Platforms 。她對TikTok是否將亞馬遜視為競爭對手不予置評。亞馬遜一位發(fā)言人表示，亞馬遜的社交購物“在過去五年增長迅猛”。
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Customer Trust — Advantage: Amazon

客戶信任方面，亞馬遜占優(yōu)

Amazon has spent years building up trust among consumers, thanks to a relentless focus on customer experience, including increasingly speedy deliveries and a lenient return policy. TikTok still has to earn that kind of trust.

亞馬遜花了多年時間在消費者中建立信任，這要歸功于對客戶體驗的不懈關注，包括越來越快的送貨速度和寬松的退貨政策。TikTok仍需贏得這種信任。

Deanna Arora, a 26-year-old in Seattle, recently made her first purchase on TikTok Shop. She bought a $9 detangling hairbrush that influencers had been posting about and spent much of the time it was in the mail wondering if it was real or a rip-off, despite scouring reviews of the seller in the app.

26歲的Deanna Arora住在西雅圖，最近她第一次在TikTok Shop上買東西。她花9美元買了一把網紅們一直在曬的順發(fā)梳，盡管她在該應用中詳細查看了賣家下面的評論，但在商品運送途中的大部分時間里，她都在懷疑這是真貨還是假貨。
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“I would have trusted the reviews more on Amazon, but clearly I was so entranced by TikTok,” she said of her purchase. It’s that type of excitement that TikTok is trying to turn into profit.

她在談到這次購物經歷時說：“我會更相信亞馬遜上的評論，但顯然我對TikTok很著迷?！盩ikTok正試圖將這種著迷轉化為利潤。

After the hairbrush arrived, she said she still didn’t know if she had received the genuine product or a knockoff, and that there was no good way to tell the difference. TikTok says it has ways for users to verify the authenticity of products purchased on the platform.

梳子到手后，她說自己仍然不知道收到的是正品還是山寨貨，也沒有很好的辦法來分辨。TikTok則稱，有辦法讓用戶驗證在其平臺上所購產品的真?zhèn)巍?/b>

Before the U.S., the company launched TikTok Shop in the U.K. in 2021, and created a “partner network” of third-party agencies that sellers could use to promote products. The shopping feature wasn’t a hit.

在將TikTok Shop引入美國市場之前，TikTok曾于2021年在英國推出了這項購物功能，并創(chuàng)建了一個由第三方代理商組成的“合作伙伴網絡”，賣家可以利用該網絡推廣產品。這一購物功能當時并未大火。

Grace Humphrey, who worked as a content creator for one such agency, said she was paid to make 15 videos a day, and that she was instructed to speak highly of all the featured items, from Apple watches to a bunx corrector.

Grace Humphrey是其中一家第三方代理商的內容創(chuàng)作者，她說自己每天制作15個視頻，能拿到報酬，并被要求高度評價從蘋果手表到拇趾外翻矯正器等所有被宣傳的商品。

“The whole point of the whole thing was to build up trust with the U.K. and get as many sales as possible,” said Humphrey, who now runs her own social-media marketing agency. But the videos, which felt stilted and forced, had the opposite effect: They made users more suspicious.

Humphrey說：“總的目的是與英國消費者建立信任，盡可能多地銷售商品?！彼F(xiàn)在經營著自己的社交媒體營銷代理機構。但這些視頻給人生硬和勉強的感覺，反而讓用戶更加懷疑。

“That was their biggest issue,” she said. “People willing to trust how legit they are.”

“這是最大的問題所在，”她說?！叭藗儾辉敢庀嘈胚@些視頻有多大的合法性?！?/b>

Internally, TikTok Shop U.K. was considered a flop, according to people familiar with the matter. TikTok is now trying to revive the business there with new features and more reliable vendors.

據知情人士稱，在TikTok內部，TikTok Shop U.K.被認為是失敗的。TikTok現(xiàn)在正試圖通過新功能和更可靠的供應商來重振這項英國業(yè)務。

Last month, the company launched the shopping feature in the U.S. It vets sellers’ identities and relies on established, independent influencers to promote products they choose.

上個月，TikTok在美國推出了完整的購物功能，對賣家的身份進行審查，并依靠公認的獨立網紅達人來帶貨。

User Engagement — Advantage: TikTok

用戶參與度方面，TikTok占優(yōu)

TikTok’s biggest advantage is its ubiquity in the U.S. The roughly two hours a day on average that U.S. users spend on TikTok leaves other companies jealous. On Amazon, U.S. customers spend an average of about 9.7 minutes a day, according to market-research firm data.ai, which tracks usage on Android devices.

TikTok最大的優(yōu)勢在于它在美國的用戶參與度。美國用戶平均每天在TikTok上花費約兩個小時，這讓其他公司羨慕不已。追蹤Android設備上應用使用情況的市場研究機構data.ai的數(shù)據顯示，美國用戶平均每天在亞馬遜平臺上花費約9.7分鐘。

In a bid to keep users engaged for longer and to create shopping experiences that would appeal to younger users, Amazon has been integrating more social features into its app.

為了讓用戶保持更長時間的參與，并創(chuàng)造會吸引年輕用戶的購物體驗，亞馬遜已在旗下應用程序中引入更多社交功能。

One, called Inspire, shows users a TikTok-style feed of photos and videos featuring products customers can purchase through the app. Amazon recently began to allow shoppers to upload content themselves on the Inspire tab and also added a “share” button that allows users to share the content and products they see. The company said customers have viewed over one billion Inspire posts since the feature launched last year.

其中一個名為Inspire的功能向用戶展示TikTok風格的照片和視頻推送，推介可以通過該應用購買的產品。亞馬遜最近開始允許購物者在Inspire上自行上傳內容，并增加了一個“分享”按鈕，用戶可分享他們看到的內容和產品。該公司表示，自去年推出Inspire功能以來，客戶已瀏覽了超過10億條Inspire帖子。

Amazon this week also revealed that it is testing another social-type feature in its app, one that allows users to get feedback on products they’re interested in from people they know.

亞馬遜上周還披露，該公司正在測試旗下應用中的另一個社交類功能，該功能使用戶可以從熟人那里獲得對其感興趣產品的反饋。
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Getting customers to care about new social features like Inspire, however, is a tough task, said Daniel Buchuk, a researcher with Watchful Technologies, which tracked Amazon’s testing and launch of the Inspire tab.

Watchful Technologies追蹤了亞馬遜對Inspire的測試和發(fā)布情況，該機構研究員Daniel Buchuk說，要讓客戶關注Inspire這樣的新社交功能是一項艱巨的任務。

Most Amazon customers are used to going to the app and website to shop for items they already have in mind, he said—not to browse an endless feed of products.

他說，大多數(shù)亞馬遜用戶習慣于在亞馬遜應用和網站上選購已有意向的商品，而不是去瀏覽無窮無盡的商品推送信息。

The company has created a way for social-media influencers to promote Amazon products and earn commissions from sales they generate through personalized “storefronts.” The challenge for Amazon is that this approach relies heavily on influencers posting on platforms like TikTok and Instagram. Influencers say Amazon’s efforts like the Inspire function haven’t grown attractive enough to focus on.

該公司已為社交網紅們創(chuàng)造出一種推銷亞馬遜平臺上所售產品的方法，網紅可以從個性化“店面”所帶來的銷售額中賺取傭金。亞馬遜面臨的挑戰(zhàn)是，這種方式高度依賴于網紅在TikTok和Instagram等平臺上發(fā)布信息。網紅們則表示，亞馬遜推出Inspire新功能的種種努力還不足以吸引到人們的重點關注。

Delivery Logistics — Advantage: Amazon by miles

配送物流方面，亞馬遜遙遙領先

TikTok has a long way to go to build a logistics apparatus that can rival Amazon.

TikTok要想建立一個能與亞馬遜匹敵的物流系統(tǒng)，還有很長的路要走。

Krystal Sprouse, a regular Amazon shopper, recently heard about a vinyl edition of Taylor Swift’s album “Reputation” for sale on TikTok’s new shopping platform for $26, a bargain for a record that can be hard to find and sometimes sells for double the price.

亞馬遜上的常客Krystal Sprouse最近聽說TikTok新推出的購物平臺上在以26美元價格售賣泰勒-斯威夫特的黑膠唱片《Reputation》，這張唱片很難買到，而且售價有時候比26美元高一倍。

Her shopping experience wasn’t nearly as seamless as on Amazon. The package from TikTok took a week to deliver and was damaged when it arrived.

但她購買這張唱片的體驗并不像在亞馬遜上那么舒服順暢。在TikTok上訂購的包裹花了一周時間才送到，而且到貨時已經損壞。

She’ll probably try TikTok Shop again, she said, but she’s not in a hurry.

她說她可能會再次嘗試在TikTok Shop上買東西，但她沒那么急。
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“I’m impatient, so I prefer to have the option to have Amazon deliver the next day,” said Sprouse, who is 31 years old and lives in Richmond, Va.

31歲的Sprouse住在弗吉尼亞州里士滿，她說：“我沒什么耐心，所以我更傾向于選擇亞馬遜上的次日達服務。”

Amazon has spent years building infrastructure that can ferry packages almost anywhere in the country in two days or less. Last year, it delivered more than 13 million packages on an average day in the U.S., according to data the company provided.

亞馬遜花費了數(shù)年時間打造基礎設施，可以在兩天或更短時間內將包裹運送到全美幾乎任何地方。根據該公司提供的數(shù)據，去年亞馬遜在美國的日均包裹遞送量超過1,300萬件。

Sellers say TikTok is telling them they must ship products to customers within three days of receiving an order or face delays in receiving payment. The company is also putting all new sellers on a probationary period and requiring them to maintain low rates of refunds and negative reviews.

賣家們表示，TikTok告訴他們必須在收到訂單后三天內向客戶發(fā)貨，否則將面臨收款延遲的問題。TikTok還給予所有新賣家試用期約束，并要求他們保持低退款率和差評率。

Furthermore, TikTok is building its own distribution networks to be able to ship items itself, something no other social-media platform has done.

除此之外，TikTok還在建立自己的分銷網絡，以便能自行發(fā)貨，這在其他社交媒體平臺上未有先例。

TikTok’s U.S. e-commerce operations have recruited workers with experience in supply chains and logistics, including executives from Amazon and eBay. Its U.S. team has grown to more than 300 people.

TikTok的美國電商業(yè)務招聘了具有供應鏈和物流經驗的員工，其中包括來自亞馬遜和eBay的高管。其美國團隊已壯大到300多人。
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When TikTok started rolling out the program, it prioritized recruiting sellers from Amazon; as of last month the app had 200,000 sellers. Amazon’s U.S. marketplace has an estimated one million active sellers.

當開始推出這個項目時，TikTok優(yōu)先從亞馬遜招募賣家；截至上個月，該應用已入駐20萬賣家。據估計，亞馬遜的美國市集上有100萬活躍賣家。

Influencer Army — Advantage: TikTok, but Amazon is slowly gaining

TikTok占據網紅大軍優(yōu)勢，而亞馬遜的網紅“帶貨”隊伍也在緩慢擴大
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The two companies are also fighting over influencers.

這兩家公司還在為爭奪網紅而戰(zhàn)。

Amazon has made strides since 2017 when it launched an influencer program, luring creators with financial incentives. For some, the payouts have become enough to replace a normal full-time job, as it did for Michelle Lei, who quit her role as a software engineer last year to become a full-time Amazon influencer.

亞馬遜自2017年推出一項網紅計劃以來已取得了長足進步，該計劃通過經濟激勵來吸引內容創(chuàng)作者。對一些人來說，這些報酬足以取代一份常規(guī)的全職工作，Michelle Lei就是這樣，她去年辭去了軟件工程師的工作，成為一名全職的亞馬遜網紅。

She said she can earn thousands of dollars a month, including one-off commissions from brands. She promotes home-decor products on sale at Amazon through her TikTok and Instagram channels.

她說，她一個月的收入可以達到數(shù)千美元，包括品牌給的一次性傭金。她通過自己的TikTok和Instagram頻道推廣亞馬遜上銷售的家居裝飾產品。
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The number of views of TikTok videos promoting Amazon Prime Day sales has doubled every year since 2019, to over 400 million for this year’s event in July, according to research firm Marketplace Pulse.

研究公司Marketplace Pulse的數(shù)據顯示，自2019年以來，推廣Amazon Prime Day銷售活動的TikTok視頻瀏覽量每年都翻一番，今年7月活動的TikTok推廣視頻瀏覽量達到逾4億次。

Amazon recently started offering influencers more analytics and tools to make it easier for them to track online traffic and sales, and now hosts retreats for influencers.

亞馬遜最近開始為網紅提供更多的分析和工具，使他們更容易跟蹤在線流量和銷售情況，現(xiàn)在還為網紅舉辦放松調整的活動。

But influencers are TikTok’s bread and butter.

不過，要知道網紅是TikTok的主要收入來源。

Kayla Ruliffson, 20, promotes makeup and skin-care products to her 100,000 TikTok followers. She first came across TikTok Shop while she was making a video about a skin-care product in July. The app prompted her to tag the product, then lixed to a place to buy it in the app.

20歲的Kayla Ruliffson向她的10萬TikTok粉絲帶貨化妝品和護膚產品。她第一次接觸TikTok Shop是在今年7月，當時她在制作一個關于護膚產品的視頻。TikTok應用提示她給這款產品打上標簽，并鏈接到可以在該應用上購買的位置。

Ruliffson said she made $3,000 within a few days.

Ruliffson說她在幾天內就賺了3,000美元。

A month later, she uploaded a video promoting a teeth-whitening tool on TikTok Shop. With that video, she said she earned more than $20,000. Her payouts from Amazon had never totaled more than $1,000 a month before.

一個月后，她又在TikTok Shop上傳了一段宣傳牙齒美白工具的視頻。她說，通過這個視頻，她賺了2萬多美元。在此之前，她一個月從亞馬遜獲得的報酬總額從未超過1,000美元。