Glossary
Plain-language video commerce terms built for AI citations.
Shoppable video
Shoppable video is a product video with tappable hotspots that let a shopper see a price and add the item to cart without leaving the clip. It turns a passive watch into a buying step, usually as an embedded widget on a product page, homepage, or landing page.
Video commerce
Video commerce is selling products through video instead of static images and text. It covers shoppable video, live shopping, and short-form product clips, all sharing one idea: the video is the storefront, and shoppers can buy from inside it rather than after watching.
Add-to-cart rate
Add-to-cart rate is the share of store sessions where a shopper adds at least one product to their cart. You calculate it as add-to-cart sessions divided by total sessions, times 100. It measures how well a product page turns interest into buying intent, one step before checkout.
Average order value (AOV)
Average order value is the average amount a customer spends per order, calculated as total revenue divided by number of orders over a period. Raising AOV lifts revenue without needing more traffic, which is why bundles, cross-sells, and free-shipping thresholds all target it.
User-generated content (UGC)
User-generated content is media made by customers and creators rather than the brand: unboxing clips, reviews, try-ons, and tutorials. In commerce it works as social proof, because shoppers trust a real customer showing a product more than a polished brand ad.
Social proof
Social proof is the tendency of shoppers to trust a product more when they can see other people choosing it: reviews, ratings, customer photos and videos, view counts, and bestseller labels. In e-commerce it reduces the perceived risk of buying from a brand you do not know yet.
Conversion rate
Conversion rate is the share of store sessions that end in a completed purchase, calculated as orders divided by sessions, times 100. It is the headline measure of how well a store turns visitors into buyers, and small improvements compound directly into revenue.
Live shopping
Live shopping is selling through a real-time video broadcast where a host shows products and viewers buy during the stream. It blends entertainment and retail, popularised in China and now spreading globally, and works best for launches, drops, and engaged community audiences.
Conversion rate optimisation (CRO)
Conversion rate optimisation is the practice of improving the share of store visitors who take a wanted action, usually a purchase. CRO works by finding where shoppers drop off, testing changes to those points, and keeping what lifts the rate, so you earn more from the traffic you already have.
Customer lifetime value (LTV)
Customer lifetime value is the total amount a customer spends with your store across every order they ever place, not just the first. It captures the full worth of a relationship over time, shaped by how often they buy, how much per order, and how long they stay a customer.
Cross-selling
Cross-selling is recommending related products alongside the one a shopper is already looking at or buying, so a single visit ends in more than one item. Think a phone case beside a phone, or matching earrings beside a kurta. It lifts average order value by selling complements to a buyer who is already in.
Upselling
Upselling is nudging a shopper toward a higher-value version of what they are already buying: a larger size, a premium variant, a bundle, or an add-on. The aim is to raise the value of an order the customer is already placing, lifting average order value without paying to acquire a new buyer.
Bounce rate
Bounce rate is the share of store sessions where a visitor lands on one page and leaves without any further interaction. You calculate it as single-page sessions divided by total sessions, times 100. A high bounce rate suggests the page did not hold attention or match what the visitor expected.
Cart abandonment
Cart abandonment is when a shopper adds products to their cart but leaves before completing the purchase. The cart abandonment rate measures how often this happens: carts not converted to orders, divided by carts created, times 100. It marks lost intent between adding to cart and paying.
Click-through rate (CTR)
Click-through rate is the share of people who click a link, ad, or element out of everyone who saw it, calculated as clicks divided by impressions, times 100. It measures how well a creative or placement earns the next action, one step before the shopper reaches your store.
Engagement rate
Engagement rate is the share of people who interact with a piece of content rather than just see it, measured as engagement actions divided by reach or views, times 100. On video it counts watches, taps, likes, shares, and clicks, showing how much an audience actually responds instead of scrolling past.
Repeat purchase rate
Repeat purchase rate is the share of your customers who buy from you more than once over a period. You calculate it as customers with two or more orders divided by total customers, times 100. It measures whether a first order turns into a lasting habit rather than a one-off.
Dwell time
Dwell time is how long a shopper actively engages with a piece of content before moving on, such as the seconds spent watching a product video or staying on a page. In video commerce it measures holding attention, since a longer watch usually means more interest and a better chance of a sale.
Shopper journey
The shopper journey is the full path a person takes from first noticing a product to buying it and coming back, across every touchpoint: an ad, a reel, a product page, the cart, checkout, and post-purchase. Mapping it shows where shoppers hesitate or drop off, so you can fix the weak step instead of guessing.
Return rate (RTO)
Return rate is the share of orders sent back instead of kept, usually shown as returns divided by total orders, times 100. In India it splits into RTO, return to origin, where a parcel never reaches the buyer and comes back, and post-delivery returns, where a delivered item is sent back.
Social commerce
Social commerce is buying and selling products directly inside social platforms and social-style content, rather than using social media only to drive traffic elsewhere. It covers in-app shops, shoppable posts, creator and influencer selling, and shoppable video, where product discovery and the buying step happen in the same flow.
Social shopping
Social shopping is buying products in a social, video-led way: discovering items through reels, creator clips, and customer videos, then purchasing with a tap. It brings the feel of scrolling a feed onto a brand's own store, so the same content that earns attention also closes the sale.
Livestream shopping
Livestream shopping is selling during a live video broadcast, where a host demonstrates products in real time and viewers buy from a pinned link or in-stream cart while watching. The draw is interaction: live questions, limited drops, and a shared event that turns a watching audience into buyers in the moment.
Interactive video
Interactive video is video a viewer can act on instead of only watch. Tappable hotspots, buttons, or choices sit on top of the clip, so a shopper can open a product, add it to cart, or jump to another video from inside the frame. In commerce, the action is usually buying.
Embedded video
Embedded video is a video clip that plays directly inside a website or product page using a small script or theme block, instead of sending the shopper to YouTube, Instagram, or TikTok. The player sits within your own layout, so the visit, the scroll, and the add-to-cart all stay on your store.
UGC video
A UGC video is a short product clip filmed by a real person, usually a customer or a small creator, rather than by a brand's in-house studio. It looks handheld and honest, and it is used on social feeds, product pages, and shoppable video widgets to show how the product behaves in real life.
Influencer marketing
Influencer marketing is paying creators with a trusted audience to talk about your product in their own voice. For D2C brands it usually means short videos on Instagram or YouTube where the creator shows the product, tells a story, and points viewers to your store. You pay a fee, a commission, free product, or a mix.
Product discovery
Product discovery is how shoppers find products they did not specifically search for. On a D2C store it covers the path from landing on a page to noticing a product worth buying, through homepage modules, category pages, recommendations, search, and short shoppable videos that put products in front of a browsing visitor.
Product detail page (PDP)
A product detail page, or PDP, is the page on an online store dedicated to a single product. It shows the images, video, price, variants, description, reviews, and the add to cart button. It is the page where a shopper actually decides to buy, so it carries most of a store's conversion weight.
Product listing page (PLP)
A product listing page, or PLP, is the page on an online store that shows a group of products together. Shoppers reach it from a category menu, a collection link, or a search. Each product appears as a card with image, title, and price, and the shopper taps a card to open the full product page.
Dynamic product page
A dynamic product page is a product detail page that builds itself from live catalogue data instead of fixed HTML. Title, images, price, stock, variants, and reviews are pulled in at load time, so any change in the store admin appears instantly across every page and channel using that product.
Conversational commerce
Conversational commerce is selling through chat surfaces like WhatsApp, Instagram DM, Messenger, and live chat, where a shopper asks questions, sees product options, and places an order inside the conversation. In India it leans heavily on WhatsApp, with payment links, COD confirmation, and order updates handled in the same thread.
Omnichannel commerce
Omnichannel commerce is a way of selling where a brand stitches every place a shopper meets it, website, Instagram, WhatsApp, marketplaces, retail stores, into one experience. Inventory, prices, carts and customer history move across channels, so the shopper can browse on one and buy on another without friction.
Headless commerce
Headless commerce is an ecommerce setup where the storefront (what shoppers see) is separated from the backend (catalogue, cart, checkout, orders). The two talk through APIs. This lets a brand build a fully custom front end in React, Next.js or a mobile app, while Shopify, BigCommerce or a similar engine handles products and payments.
First-party data
First-party data is information a brand collects directly from its own shoppers through its website, app, checkout, widgets, or messaging. It includes orders, product views, video engagement, email, phone, and on-site behaviour. Because the brand owns the relationship, it can use this data for personalisation and remarketing without depending on third-party cookies.
Zero-party data
Zero-party data is information a customer shares with a brand on purpose, through quizzes, polls, preference centres, wishlists, or post-purchase surveys. It is different from tracked behaviour. The shopper knows they are giving it and expects the brand to use it for better recommendations, personalised offers, and clearer communication.
Personalisation
Personalisation is the practice of changing what a shopper sees on a storefront based on signals about them, such as past behaviour, location, device, or stage in the buying journey. It can adjust product order, recommendations, banners, video clips, offers, and messaging so each visitor gets a more relevant experience instead of one fixed page.
Retail media
Retail media is advertising inventory sold by a retailer or marketplace on its own digital storefront and app. Brands pay for sponsored listings, banners, and video placements that sit next to real shopper intent. The retailer earns ad revenue while using its first-party purchase data to target and measure the campaigns.
Video SEO
Video SEO is the practice of making product videos findable by search engines and AI answer tools. It covers titles, descriptions, transcripts, schema markup, thumbnails, and the page the video sits on, so the clip earns traffic from Google, YouTube, and on-site search, then converts that traffic into shoppers.
Instagram Reels for commerce
Instagram Reels for commerce means using short vertical videos on Instagram to sell products, either through in-app shopping tags, link stickers, and DMs, or by repurposing the same Reels on your own store as shoppable video. The goal is to turn watch time into product views and add-to-carts.
TikTok Shopping
TikTok Shopping is the set of commerce features inside TikTok that let brands sell products directly through short videos, live streams, and a profile-level shop tab. Shoppers see a product card or tagged item in the feed, tap it, and check out without leaving the app, all powered by TikTok's own catalogue and payment flow.
WhatsApp commerce
WhatsApp commerce is the practice of selling, supporting, and re-engaging shoppers through WhatsApp. Indian D2C brands use the WhatsApp Business app or the WhatsApp Business API to share catalogues, answer queries, send order updates, recover abandoned carts, and close sales using payment links, UPI, or WhatsApp Pay.
Cash on delivery (COD)
Cash on delivery, or COD, is a payment method where an Indian shopper orders online but pays in cash to the courier at the doorstep when the package arrives. The store ships first and collects later. It is the most trusted checkout option for first-time buyers in India, especially outside metros.
Shoppable video ROI
Shoppable video ROI is the return a store earns from its shoppable video programme, measured as attributed revenue minus the cost of producing, importing, and running the widget, divided by that cost. It tells a D2C operator whether the videos on their product pages and home page are paying back what the team puts into them.
Carousel widget
A carousel widget is a strip of shoppable video tiles that a shopper swipes through on a product or home page. Each tile plays a short clip with tappable product tags, so the buyer can see a price and add to cart inside the strip. It sits inline, horizontal or vertical, on any storefront.
Floating video widget
A floating video widget is a small shoppable video player that sits in a corner of a website while the shopper browses other pages. It plays a short product clip in a picture-in-picture style frame, with tappable hotspots that show price and an add-to-cart action without taking the shopper off the page they are on.
Reel feed widget
A reel feed widget is a vertical, full-screen video feed embedded on a store, modelled on the swipe-up reel experience shoppers already know from Instagram and YouTube Shorts. Each clip plays one at a time, autoplays muted, and carries tappable product tags so a shopper can view a price and add to cart inside the feed.
AI shopping assistant
An AI shopping assistant is a chat or voice helper inside a store that answers product questions, suggests items, and guides shoppers to checkout. It uses a language model trained on the catalogue, reviews, and policies, so it can recommend a kurta size, compare two creams, or explain a return window in plain language.
AI shopping agent
An AI shopping agent is a software assistant that uses a large language model to help a shopper find, compare, and sometimes buy products in natural language. It reads catalogues, asks clarifying questions, and surfaces options. Some agents only recommend, others can place the order on the shopper's behalf through a connected store.
Web stories
Web stories are vertical, full-screen, tap-through pages built from short video or image frames with text overlays. They live on your own domain as indexed URLs, so they can rank in Google Search and Discover, be shared on WhatsApp, and link out to product pages. The format is mobile-first and works without an app.