Field notes from
the shop floor.

Target by conversion, not followers; make the offer the outreach; treat the sample as a two-way audition; and understand that retention, not recruitment, is the real program.

No standard rate exists. What is consistent: four bill lines, three fee shapes, and four questions that expose a padded quote in ten minutes.

The five stages inside TikTok's platform, what discipline each one needs, and why campaigns that end at "the video posted" capture a fraction of the value.

Why we will not print a requirements checklist, what to verify in Seller Center instead, and the one operational precondition that never changes.

Most TikTok agency claims can be checked in under an hour: view counts on TikTok itself, partner status by program name, entity registration, and whether numbers belong to the company or the team.

Peers publish outreach volume. Here is the actual chain: setting commission, vetting creators, briefing, sample dispatch, chasing, how TikTok attributes a sale, and re-activating the creators who convert.

What actually happens in the first three months of a TikTok Shop program, what the brand has to supply at each stage, and why week three is where most programs wobble.

Most briefs are either a brand-guideline dump or a word-for-word script. Both produce videos that don't sell. The structure that works has five parts.

The first two weeks feel great. Then content velocity collapses and the shop goes quiet. The stall is predictable, and preventable.

Most brands ship ten samples, get two videos, and conclude seeding doesn't work. The problem isn't seeding. It's the math.

Two very different tools that get lumped together. One rule of thumb sorts almost every situation.