With more than 85.4 million users in Mexico (Kepios & ByteDance, 2025), TikTok has become an extremely attractive platform for brands, and although many of them believe that advertising on TikTok and selling through TikTok Shop are practically the same thing, the reality is that each works differently.
Differences between TikTok Ads and TikTok Shop
On one hand, TikTok Ads works similarly to Meta Ads or Google Ads, meaning the brand allocates a budget and TikTok distributes the ads across your different campaigns, whether they are for reach, engagement, followers, traffic, sales, etc.
Meanwhile, TikTok Shop turns the platform into an extension of your ecommerce, meaning your store's products can appear linked to content, and the user can discover and purchase them within the TikTok ecosystem.
Although both options allow you to sell products from your store, each operates on its own model.
With TikTok Ads, the user journey would be as follows: TikTok → ad → Shopify store → purchase. That is, the ad you are paying for through your campaigns will send the user to your website, where they will complete the purchase.
On the other hand, with TikTok Shop, the user does not need to leave their browsing on TikTok to complete the sale, with the flow being as follows: Video → product → purchase on TikTok Shop.
While the operating model is the main difference between these channels, the following table breaks down other points that allow for a better understanding of how each works:
Which is better?
The reality is that neither is better than the other, nor do they compete; they simply fulfill different functions within your strategy.
TikTok Ads makes sense when you want to generate awareness, traffic, or conversions and already have your own ecommerce that you want to continue using as your main sales channel, and TikTok Shop makes sense when you want TikTok to be a direct part of the purchasing process, not just discovery.
What we recommend at NOWMA is consulting with a professional to evaluate together how you can incorporate both TikTok Ads and TikTok Shop efforts into your marketing strategy.