GoKawiilIf you've ever been scrolling TikTok and paused on a glamorous, faraway destination that you just had to see for yourself, you're in luck. TikTok GO is a way for users to book local services from within the social media app. Experiences such as tours, hotels and attractions that appear in posts can now be booked from a new menu in TikTok. The company is launching this option in partnership with multiple other travel and experience platforms, including Booking.com, Expedia, GetYourGuide, Tiqet, Trip.com and Viator. TikTok users must be in the US and at least age 18 in order to make a booking.
The new feature also creates new potential revenue streams for creators by earning commissions or participating in campaigns to highlight businesses that are bookable through TikTok GO. Some accounts might have seen posts using this concept last year when it was in a testing phase.
TikTok has been adding more ways to support transactions on its platform over the years. In 2021, it added a Shopping tab for business users backed by Shopify. TikTok Shop is a more general way to buy stuff you see in videos, and TikTok GO seems like a more specialized take on that concept. On one hand, big-ticket purchases for travel seem like an odd choice to treat as essentially an impulse buy. On the other hand, the urge to drop everything and get away from it all seems to be at an all-time high for many of us, so maybe this is actually a genius idea.