YouTube Takes its Next Steps into Live-Stream Commerce via Beauty Fest 2022

YouTube continues to steadily merge more commerce elements into its app, this time through the implementation of direct shopping in its 2022 Beauty Fest streams.

As explained in the above clip, this year, YouTube’s Beauty Festival will enable viewers to shop what they see directly in the live-stream.

YouTube’s been experimenting with live stream commerce elements over the last year, and now it’s looking for more ways to maximize the reach and engagement of shopping streams, in the hopes of encouraging more direct buying behavior in the app.

YouTube’s 2022 Beauty Festival will feature a range of celebrities, including Gwen Stefani, Hailey Bieber, Kehlani, Ashley Graham and more.

As per YouTube:

“On June 16th, fans around the world can tune in to see 2022’s biggest stars and hottest brands come together for the ultimate celebration of beauty on YouTube, hosted by YouTube’s Head of Fashion and Beauty, Derek Blasberg, LIVE from Los Angeles.”

The popularity of these big names will help to amplify the reach of YouTube’s shopping streams, which will serve as a great promotion for its live shopping elements, which it’s eventually hoping to make available to all users.

Live-stream shopping offers big potential, and is already a major trend in Asian markets. Indeed, Chinese live shopping revenues are expected reach $400 billion this year alone, which would be equivalent to almost half of all eCommerce spending in the US in 2021. Live-stream commerce has also proven increasingly popular among younger audiences, with users aged 27 and under seeing the fastest adoption of the practice.

That’s why every US-based video platform is now eyeing the potential, and already, some streamers on TikTok and YouTube are making big money by selling products via regular live-streams.

It remains to be seen if those same trends will take hold in western markets, but Meta, YouTube and TikTok are all gearing up to find out, with each app developing their own live-stream commerce tools to facilitate the potential trend.

Showcasing these elements in a popular stream like this will help YouTube boost interest in its options, giving it the best chance to capitalize on such – if, again, it’s ever going to become a thing.

In addition to this, YouTube’s also running its first-ever Shoppable Shorts Challenge, in association with Beauty Fest.

“On Wednesday, June 8th, Glossier will launch their never-before-seen No. 1 Pencil eyeliner exclusively on YouTube Shorts, led by music artist and beauty-lover Kehlani, and fans can use the hashtag #WrittenInGlossier to participate! Every Short created with the hashtag will be Shoppable using the link directly on the video.”

Every short shoppable? That’s pretty interesting – and no doubt various brands will be keeping an eye on this activation as a potential marketing tool for their own use at some stage.

Shorts, while it is a direct copy of TikTok, has proven increasingly popular, with Shorts clips now driving over 30 billion daily views in the app. The challenge with short video, however, is that it’s not easy to monetize, with no option for pre or mid-roll ads that can be directly attributed to each clip.

As such, every platform is now working to establish a better revenue share pathway for short-form content.

This could be another step in that path, which could help to make Shorts a more appealing option for creators.  

Again, it remains to be seen just how interested western audiences are in in-stream shopping, and buying products via live broadcasts, but the indications are that it could be a big thing, and with the added celebrity endorsement, this could be a big step in YouTube’s efforts.

You can catch all of the Beauty Fest content on June 16th at YouTube.com/BeautyFest