Aaliyah Arnold, the 21-year-old founder of BossUp Cosmetics, goes live on TikTok a few times a week. Each livestream will last anywhere from 4 to 12 hours. Thousands tune in to watch her pack mystery boxes for customers, give away products, and teach makeup tutorials.

“I mix in music, jokes, giveaways, and real product demos so people feel like they’re hanging out with me while shopping,” Arnold tells Fast Company. Livestreaming now makes up 60% of her company’s total sales. Her biggest livestream to date hit $170,000 in sales, with more than 1 million viewers tuning in.

Arnold is one of many solopreneurs on platforms like TikTok leaning into “live selling” to get ahead in the ecommerce industry. Dubbed Gen Z’s answer to QVC, live selling has been big in China for almost a decade, but so

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