Tag: New Feature

Singapore – TikTok has rolled out its new ‘Shop’ tab feature for its e-commerce solution, TikTok Shop, to offer users a more convenient way to access its shopping portal.

The ‘Shop’ tab feature, represented by a shopping bag icon, takes users straight into TikTok Shop’s shopping portal in one touch, providing greater convenience and interaction for online shoppers and merchants.

With the new feature, online shoppers will easily have access to the familiar shopping interface where they can browse products, view orders, access their shopping cart, set addresses and payment methods, and chat with merchants.

Furthermore, the products in the Shop tab are also divided into categories to help users quickly and easily find what they are looking for. The feature also highlights products that are based on the users’ habits and interests while using the app. This ensures an even more pleasurable and convenient experience for users while also assisting merchants by having their products matched with a customer’s profile.

Additionally, the top of the page contains prominent flash sale information and countdown timers to remind users of sale discounts and other shop and item promotions.

Doven Yap, seller acquisition lead at TikTok Shop Singapore, said, “TikTok Shop has a rapidly growing community, and our innovation and developments are meant to address the desires of sellers, merchants, and creators to learn, discover, and promote one another on TikTok. The Shop Tab becomes a natural extension of the users’ journey from being entertained to learning something new and getting interested in buying. Consequently, this feature lets businesses grow to be discovered more easily and gain more new customers, leveraging the power of the TikTok community.”

Singapore – Carousell Media Group, the advertising arm of Carousell Group, has launched its new ad solution, Shopping Ads, to support brands in acquiring new customers and increasing sales. 

Carousell’s Shopping Ads will help provide the most relevant ads to consumers via an optimised product feed triggered by the consumer’s search queries on Carousell’s marketplaces, giving an efficient and effective way for advertisers to boost traffic to their e-commerce stores and increase sales. 

“Product search ads and their efficacy are the driving force behind the retail media

phenomenon. With over 150M product searches on our marketplaces every month, this ad solution is a natural fit that benefits both consumers and our advertising clients through more relevant and effective ads,” said JJ Eastwood, managing director of Carousell Media Group.

Earlier this year, Carousell Media Group also introduced Connect, a first-of-its-kind recommerce programmatic buying platform. By providing full-funnel marketing solutions, Connect provides advertisers with a viable alternative to closed environments such as Google and Facebook.

Vietnam – Cho Tot, an online classified marketplace in Vietnam, has launched a ‘Protected Payment’ feature to enhance the safety and convenience of buying and selling secondhand items. The company also has a solid plan to reshape the future of recommerce via building a comprehensive ecosystem.

Cho Tot is a part of the Carousell Group, a classifieds marketplace group in Greater Southeast Asia. Since launching in Vietnam in 2013, Cho Tot has become a well-known recommerce platform with more than 10 million unique monthly users and more than 1 million used items listed every month. Unlike the traditional consumption cycle, which comprises buying new items and then discarding them, Carousell and Cho Tot enable consumers to buy and sell used items, extending the life cycle of these items. Reinforcing the circular economy helps the community take steps together towards fulfilling the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

In order to increase trust in transacting on secondhand items, Cho Tot’s ‘Protected Payment’ feature is an escrow payment system that provides assurance to users by holding payment until a transaction is verified as successful by both buyer and seller. Supported by third-party payment platforms—mobile e-wallet platform MoMo and intermediary payment service Payoo, as well as on-demand logistics firm Ahamove—transactions via this method are recorded and ensured under Cho Tot’s protection policy. Buyers will be refunded in full if they do not receive items or if the items do not match the description. In addition, Cho Tot will assist in mediating disputes between buyers and sellers in cases of dispute, based on platform policy, to ensure transparency and the rights of both parties. 

Additionally, Cho Tot users can now experience much more convenience when buying and selling used items. Previously, transactions of used items would include multiple steps from contacting the seller, bargaining, making an appointment, verifying items, to making payment. Now, buyers only need to click ‘Buy Now’ and make payment, and the item will be shipped to their address as seamlessly as buying a brand new item on an e-commerce site. 

On the recommerce growth strategy, Hoang Thi Minh Ngoc, chief growth officer of Cho Tot, said, “With the feature of ‘Protected Payment’, we are reshaping the experience of buying and selling used goods to be safer and more convenient. We are planning to develop a comprehensive ecosystem for recommerce via working with strategic partners providing inspection, authentication, warranty and finance solutions; combining online platform and offline services to enhance the user experience for both buyers and sellers.

“In addition, Cho Tot also partners with organisations advocating for circular economy and sustainable development to encourage consumers to prioritize used items as their first choice, moving towards sustainable consumption,” Hoang adds.

On the partnership with Cho Tot to enhance the buying and selling experience of used items, Nguyen Manh Tuong, vice chairman and CEO of MoMo, shared, “We are proud to provide a secure payment solution and secure account for this pioneering feature of Cho Tot. MoMo believes that this partnership will help solve the ‘bottleneck’ for recommerce in Vietnam, remove barriers, and provide an outstanding experience in buying and selling secondhand.” 

Meanwhile, Quek Siu Rui, co-founder and CEO of Carousell, commented, “During the past 10 years, we have tirelessly made efforts to inspire people all over the world to start selling and buying secondhand items. Climate change and over-consumption have made us realise more than ever the importance and relevance of our mission.” 

Rui added, “With the introduction of ‘Protected Payment’ on Cho Tot, we are prioritising a safer, more reliable and more convenient experience in selling and buying secondhand items as the core focus of our growth strategy, directing towards serving the various demands of tens of millions of users in Southeast Asia, Hong Kong and Taiwan. Across these countries, Vietnam is our strategic market due to its largest user base and significant growth rate. We’re doubling down on our support for the Cho Tot team to accelerate growth organically, and we’d be keen to explore inorganic options too.” 

Singapore — Integral Ad Science (IAS), a digital media company, has launched Control Panel, a suite of reporting and planning tools that Context Control customers can use as an added value. The new capabilities will enable customers to more clearly understand the value and return on investment that IAS’s contextual targeting solution delivers.

The Control Panel suite offers the following new tools namely Context Control Segment Catalog, which provides easy discovery of all Context Control Avoidance and Targeting off-the-shelf segments all in one place; and Contextual Segment Reach Calculator, which advises on the prospective reach of IAS contextual targeting segments to appropriately plan campaigns.

There is also the Contextual Targeting Reporting tool that offers insights into targeting segment performance, specifically focusing on viewability, reach, and programmatic dimensions. The last tool is Contextual Targeting Profiles which enables clients to bundle all of their desired targeting segments into one profile with a single segment ID for easy activation in their demand side platforms (DSP).

Tom Sharma, chief product officer of IAS, said, “Using our new Control Panel, advertisers will gain the ability to strategically plan, activate, and optimize their targeting campaigns all within the IAS Signal platform. This is yet another example of our ongoing efforts to empower our customer organizations and clients to confidently lean into our contextual targeting solution while hitting campaign KPIs.”

Advertisers can average more than 400 contextual segments from IAS on a pre-bid basis to avoid undesirable content or target content that is suitable for their campaigns. Major DSPs including Adelphic, Adform, Amobee, MediaMath, Xandr, Yahoo, and others have integrated Context Control, making these tools readily available for advertisers wherever they choose to buy.

Singapore – Singapore-based shopping and rewards platform ShopBack, has launched ShopBack Pay, a cashless payment feature to make payments more convenient and rewarding for consumers.

In a single app, consumers can now pay it their way by linking their favourite payment methods and making their in-store purchases easily, as well as stack additional cashback on top of rewards from their preferred payment method.

The new feature excludes the need for users to top up funds on ShopBack Pay, instead allowing them to simply link their preferred payment method (Mastercard, Visa, or GrabPay) available on the ShopBack app, and in-store payments will be directly debited from the linked payment method in real-time.

On top of the cashback offered by ShopBack Pay merchants, users will also receive rewards from their preferred payment methods, such as credit card benefits and the ability to earn GrabRewards points. ShopBack Pay’s QR scan and pay feature, which is available on its app, will allow users to make payments at physical stores as well. 

Julian Foo, head of payments at ShopBack, shared, “Our goal at ShopBack has always been to add value to and shape one’s shopping experience with ShopBack Pay, right from the start when users easily discover merchants on the app to making their payments with cashback as a loyalty scheme.” 

Kanika Maheshwari, head of consumer segment at Grab Financial Group Singapore, commented, “We want to provide the most rewarding and convenient payment experience to our GrabPay users by enabling the widest range of online and offline payment methods, as well as helping them maximise the value out of every dollar they spend. Through this collaboration, GrabPay users can not only earn GrabRewards points from their transactions, but also gain additional cashback incentives via ShopBack Pay.”

The ShopBack Pay feature, which has onboarded over 3,000 merchants since its pilot launch on January 17, will be available to ShopBack’s 2 million users. In addition, ShopBack has partnered Grab to drive the use of GrabPay on ShopBack Pay so users can maximise the cashback benefits and rewards from both platforms. 

Furthermore, ShopBack Pay users will receive a $2 incentive reward on their first ShopBack Pay transaction linked to GrabPay from March 8 until May 31, 2022. During the same time period, first-time ShopBack Pay members will receive 100% cashback on their first transaction, with a $5 minimum expenditure and a $5 maximum cashback. Existing ShopBack users are also eligible for this offer.

Jakarta, Indonesia – Tokopedia has launched the ‘Cash Waqf’ feature, a charitable endowment digital feature to give Muslims in Indonesia more ways to carry out their worship. The feature is part of its Tokopedia Salam ecosystem – a channel for halal-certified and Muslim-friendly products and services.

The new feature enables users to donate money helping accelerate halal economic development. This is created in collaboration with several institutions, including the Indonesian Waqf Board (BWI), Dompet Dhuafa, and Rumah Zakat. 

Director of public policy and government relations at Tokopedia, Astri Wahyuni, said that the role of technology is becoming increasingly crucial in facilitating various aspects of people’s lives, including carrying out worship. 

“Starting from Rp.10,000, now anyone can help improve the welfare of others through the Cash Waqf feature on Tokopedia,” Wahyuni said.

“We hope that this feature can make it easier for people to share their kindness, especially during Ramadan, as well as to encourage digital equalization of the sharia economy in Indonesia,” added Wahyuni. 

Meanwhile, Chairperson of the BWI Implementing Body, Prof. Dr. Ir. H. Mohammad Nuh, DEA, shared, “Apart from being a form of worship, cash waqf has a socio-economic function and role, especially in building the country’s economic independence. This has become easier through collaboration between BWI and digital platforms such as Tokopedia. It is also in line with the direction of digital transformation that we are promoting. “

“Digital platforms such as Tokopedia play an important role in socializing the halal industry as well as encouraging waqf literacy in Indonesia. Hopefully, this initiative can accelerate the development of the sharia economy in order to strengthen national resilience,” said Ventje Rahardjo, the executive director of the National Committee for Sharia Economics and Finance (KNEKS).

The presence of the Cash Waqf feature is also a form of the platform’s support for the National Movement for Cash Waqf (GNWU) initiated by Indonesia’s government.

Besides ‘Cash Waqf’, the platform also has other charity features in Tokopedia Salam, such as Donation, Zakat, and Fidyah, as well as Charity Box, and Qurban.

Manila, Philippines – Video-sharing app TikTok has recently launched a new fact-checking prompt for users’ content, and the feature is now available for Filipino users. 

The platform announced the new feature in February in an aim to counter inauthentic, misleading, or false content shared by users, which was first rolled out in Canada and the US, and to be integrated into TikTok platforms globally over the coming weeks. 

TikTok will now be checking if a certain content shared by a user is factual, and will be delivering necessary prompts and implementing appropriate actions to notify users accordingly. 

When a video has been reviewed but that its content cannot be conclusively validated, a prompt in form of a banner will appear in the video. If a viewer attempts to share the flagged video, they will see a prompt reminding them that the video has been flagged as unverified content.

Meanwhile, if it is finalized to be false content, the video will outrightly be removed from the platform. In the event that content is not able to be confirmed by the fact checks, the video will be ineligible for recommendation into the app users’ ‘For You’ feed, helping limit the spread of potentially misleading information. 

The platform said that the additional step requires for people to pause and consider their next move before choosing to ‘cancel’ or ‘share anyway,’ which is exactly what TikTok aims to do, to help users “be mindful about what they share.”

For the new feature, TikTok has partnered with fact-checkers at PolitiFact, Lead Stories, and SciVerify to help assess the accuracy of contents. It also shared that the feature has been initially tested with Irrational Labs, a behavioral science lab.

TikTok has previously launched a series of educational videos called ‘Be Informed’ which was created in partnership with the National Association of Media Literacy Education. TikTok said the new fact-checking feature is part of its ongoing work to advance media literacy.

Sydney, Australia — To help marketers and creative professionals, Wrike, a collaborative work management platform has introduced new features to accelerate website updates and digital campaigns by adding HTML support to its proofing capability to help speed up the website production process.

Offered as part of Wrike for Marketers, Wrike’s proofing feature allows teams to collaboratively review and approve digital assets including website pages, email, and landing page assets across marketing automation systems, CMS, and most cloud-based MarTech applications. Marketers can centralize proofing of digital assets into Wrike to accelerate their campaigns. 

The design and development of webpages involve a lot of constantly changing pieces – from graphic design, images, color schemes, and layout. Wrike’s new feature integrated in Wrike for Marketers attaches web content to a task or project from a URL, allows users to interact and provide visual markups, and easily compares snapshots with a live view of the webpage. Web teams can eliminate chaos and disruption, and reduce delays, challenges, and errors in the overall approval of a project.

“Wrike changes the workflow from inefficient and limited manual approval processes to on-demand solutions that open the review process to a wider audience,” said Alexey Korotich, VP of Product Management at Wrike. “With Wrike, leading organizations can help their teams simplify and streamline their creative and marketing production, spending less time on disjointed processes and instead focusing on serving the needs of their clients.”

Fintar Lalor, Regional Manager, APAC at Wrike, added, “With an enhanced and seamless user experience for reviewing digital assets and HTML web content without losing context, marketers are able to move faster and experience a more fluid collaboration process. Manual approval processes so often hinder visibility and accessibility across teams, not to mention they’re typically time-consuming and inefficient.

“Our latest Wrike update means teams can collaboratively review and approve digital assets in one centralized system. Marketers who previously struggled with chaotic review processes can now simplify and streamline creative production from conception right through to execution.”, said, Lalor.