Amazon is showing signs that it wants to accelerate engagement around its new Inspire feed. For those unfamiliar, this is its scrolling content feed that contains TikTok-style short videos that showcase Amazon-sold products. It’s a broader attempt to boost conversions using the language of Gen-Z.
But to make it all happen, Amazon realizes that it has to seed the content so that early users don’t show up to a ghost town – a classic chicken and egg dilemma. So it’s accelerating that process by offering creators cold-hard cash to start producing product-centric videos for the Inspire feed.
To do this, Bloomberg reports that Amazon is offering $12,500 for a maximum of 500 videos, first communicated through emails to select creators and influencers. This breaks down to $25 per qualifying video which has received some colorful pushback in public channels such as X (formerly Twitter).
Amazon is offering up to $12,500 ($25/video) for influencers to submit videos 👀 pic.twitter.com/pyQAEaZiTE
— Drojo24 (@Dro_Hannah) August 16, 2023
Dressed in Social Content
Backing up, what is Inspire? It’s Amazon’s attempt to bring product discovery to its otherwise intent-driven use case. It’s all about product placement in virally-fueled videos from influencers, brands, and other users. This makes shoppability – though dressed in social content – the endgame.
The feed itself features video and images, making it a sort of hybrid between TikTok, Instagram, and Pinterest. The design language and UX are also similar to Instagram, including double-tapping items to like them. And users can swipe up to advance to the next video, just like they do on TikTok.
From a user’s perspective, they can find the Inspire feed in Amazon’s Shopping app where a lightbulb icon is placed prominently on the bottom navigation bar. They can then personalize the feed by choosing from 20 categories including design, travel, fitness, pets, skincare, gaming, and a handful of others.
After that initial setup, the feed will customize itself over time using signed-in users’ likes, purchases, and other Amazon first-party data. Beyond paying creators, Amazon has already gotten things rolling with a handful of brands and influencers including Mae Badiyan, Practically Pursia, and others.
Logistical Variables
But the most important aspect of the Inspire feed is engagement buttons on each video, as they lead users where Amazon wants them to go – product listings. After tapping to see product details, a pop-up overlay offers several options. For example, a “see all details” button lets them jump to a product page.
That last part is key: if a buy button is offered within a given social discovery app, you don’t need to leave that app. This is good for the user and the social channel (read: lesser bounce rate). And it’s good for privacy-friendliness as the insular UX means that it’s all first-party data. Amazon is big on this factor.
Meanwhile, Amazon’s move here is the latest example of copying features, which has become accepted in big tech. Meta copies Snap, Google copies Meta, and everyone these days is copying TikTok. This trend accelerated a few years ago with Instagram’s high-profile copy of Snapchat’s Stories format.
But don’t feel bad for TikTok, as it’s in the process of copying Amazon’s core business. As we recently examined, it’s evolving from a social feed that includes links to eCommerce stores to an eCommerce player in its own right. This could be a difficult climb given all the logistical variables. We’ll be watching.
