TikTok Shop Reviews
My role
Solution
What is TikTok Shop?
TikTok Shop started in Southeast Asia and launched in the US and UK in September 2023. The platform is designed to meet users where they are, allowing them to purchase products instantly while watching their favorite influencers recommend them. As reviews are a key factor in purchase decisions, our goal was to increase the quantity, quality, and credibility of product reviews without disrupting the user experience.
Problem
TikTok Shop faced a challenge with low review submission rates (<8%) and insufficient product feedback, which impacted user trust and conversion.
Existing reviews were minimal, un-detailed, and didn’t help users make an informed purchase decisions.
Research & Insights
User behavior data showed that less than 10% of users clicked the ingress point to write a review. Even fewer wrote a review.
User feedback indicated that customers needed time with the product to form opinions, with many reviews being requested too early to reflect actual experiences.
A/B test validated that displaying ratings & reviews drives an incremental +2.01% GMV ($549K/day) and reduces returns by -3.55%.
Designs
Feature review page
We revamped TikTok Shop reviews to make customer feedback more structured and actionable, helping shoppers make faster, smarter decisions. Focusing on Beauty and Fashion, we introduced category-specific prompts (e.g., fit, material, color) to guide more useful reviews.
I partnered with content design to tailor these questions, improving both the shopper experience and the quality of insights used to drive future product improvements.
Explorations
Scales & Stars | Emojis | Binary | Sliders |
|---|---|---|---|
🟢 Pros: Consistent with star ratings used in Step 1 of review flow | Playful, captures emotion | Requires less user effort to answer | Same treatment for wide range of answers |
🔴 Cons: Question about color breaks the scale | Information may not connect with future machine learning model | Does not capture a wider range of answers | Requires more dev lift to create new UI |
Motivation through platform incentives
We created an incentivized review program. Given that the feature review page (above) added an extra step through the review flow, we wanted to ensure the process felt valuable to users. To make writing a review worthwhile, users who submitted reviews that met specific requirements would receive a coupon for TikTok Shop, encouraging them to engage and rewarding them with savings on their next purchase. This approach aimed for participation and to foster ongoing interaction with the platform.
Card detail
Transparency was a big factor in building trust with customers. We needed to clearly indicate which reviews were incentivized. I worked closely with our legal and content design teams to align on compliant and user-friendly messaging.
Dynamic Incentive Progress
Review loops and supplementary touchpoints
Once a user is done with their review, we invite them to create another review. If there is a review waiting with an incentive, those are prioritized first. Touchpoints were designed across relevant places within the shopping experience such as:
Optimization tests
We ran numerous A/B tests to optimize the review flow and increase overall review coverage. Examples of tests we ran include (title vs. no title, page reordering, CTA copy, making different fields optional/required).
Final designs
Outcome and next steps
15% increase in review submission rates, building greater trust in products and the platform
5% boost in product conversion since the launch of incentive reviews
23% increase in review coverage for products with over 10 sales and 10+ reviews
Reviews vision work and other exciting projects at TikTok
After the success of incentive reviews and increasing reviews coverage, I worked on Milestone 2 which was focused on GenAI-powered summaries, sentiment analysis, and aggregated fit insights. Below are some snippets of my last work at TikTok prior to departing.
Gen AI
