How Whatnot is pushing social commerce forward amid TikTok’s uncertain future

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts • Spotify
During the weekend when TikTok was briefly offline, Whatnot — a platform that lets online brands and merchants sell products via livestreams on its app and website — saw its user numbers surge.
“It was our biggest weekend for new sellers — both in terms of news sign-ups and also sellers who went live for the first time,” said Armand Wilson, vp of categories and expansion at Whatnot. “Over that Saturday, Sunday, Monday, we saw a huge spike — and we continued to see those numbers since then.”
It points to the uncertainty permeating the social media landscape right now. While TikTok is back up and running, it’s unclear what its future is in the U.S. And more brands are testing out other startup social commerce platforms.
On this week’s Modern Retail Podcast, Wilson spoke about the rise of Whatnot as well as what he’s witnessed during the last six months when TikTok’s future became unclear. “Particularly [at] the tail end of last year, we are hitting this kind of inflection point,” he said.
Still, Wilson was clear that even though TikTok, a major competitor, has been constantly in the news, he and his team tried to remain focused. “We really, truly tried to not spend a ton of time thinking about competition,” he said.
At the same time, the constant changes likely had an impact on overall adoption of social commerce, which still remains nascent in the U.S. “We’ve definitely seen a big growth in live shopping as a whole,” he said. “And I’m sure some of that can be attributed to some of our competitors pushing and getting more vocal.”
Here are a few highlights from the conversation, which have been lightly edited for clarity.
Live commerce hits and inflection point
“It’s definitely felt like, particularly [at] the tail end of last year, we are hitting this kind of inflection point. We’ve known for years how engaging it is. And I think when people kind of discover Whatnot… It’s one of those [situations where] if you know, you know. And so, the people who have discovered Whatnot, the engagement is just pretty incredible. So, the typical buyer buys 12 things per week. They spend upwards of 80 minutes on the app per week, which is, like, more than any other social media platform. And so when people find Whatnot — and they find a category they’re super engaged [with] and they kind of fall in love with it — I think what we’re seeing is [that] live shopping is becoming more and more mainstream — especially as we launch into more mainstream categories.”
Eyes on the prize
“[The impending TikTok ban] was kind of like noise. But I think that was more just how we always operated internally, where we really, truly tried to not spend a ton of time thinking about competition. We think live is really the future. One of the stats that we’re excited about is there’s a McKinsey report that reported that 10% to 20% of all e-commerce by 2026 will be through live commerce. And so, for us, we’ve just been really focused on that and how do we build the best platform that really helps anyone build a really strong business off of the back of live. And so that’s been the focus where competition has come up a bunch of different times throughout the years of Whatnot. And I think it’s validating. It shows, I think, that we’re onto something. But we never let it become a distraction to what our main purpose is.”
Brands slowly testing the waters
“I think, for brands, [live commerce adoption is] still pretty slow moving as big companies try to figure out, like, what is their approach to social. That’s kind of why we think competition is a good thing because it’s getting more eyes on what we already believe in and… the power of live shopping. So we’ve definitely seen a big growth in live shopping as a whole. And I’m sure some of that can be attributed to some of our competitors pushing and getting more vocal.”