Glossary
One-sentence definitions of the terms that come up most often in live and video commerce.
Core concepts
Live Commerce
Live commerce is selling through a real-time video broadcast where viewers can buy without leaving the stream.
UGC (User-Generated Content)
UGC is photo, video, or review content created by actual customers rather than the brand, and it typically earns more trust than advertising.
D2C Live Commerce
D2C live commerce runs the broadcast inside the brand's own store and app rather than on a marketplace or social platform, so the customer data and the margin stay with the brand.
Short-form Commerce
Short-form commerce attaches products to vertical videos of roughly a minute or less, shortening the distance between discovery and purchase.
First-Party Data
First-party data is information a brand collects directly from customers on its own channels, and it becomes the core asset for repeat-purchase marketing after third-party cookies go away.
Omnichannel Commerce
Omnichannel commerce runs the web store, app, physical stores, and social channels as one connected experience, so a customer gets the same information and offers wherever they start.
Social Commerce
Social commerce is discovery and purchase happening inside platforms like Instagram or TikTok — strong on reach, but the customer data stays with the platform.
Video Commerce
Video commerce is the umbrella term for selling through video — live, short-form, and one-to-one video consultation — with live commerce as one format within it.
Zero-Party Data
Zero-party data is information customers deliberately volunteer — through surveys, polls, or preference choices — making it more accurate than behavioral data that has to be inferred.
Live Host
The live host presents the broadcast, explains products, and answers viewer questions — one of the biggest determinants of whether a broadcast converts.
Features
Highlight Clip
A highlight clip is a short-form video cut from the strongest moments of a longer live broadcast so the content keeps working after the stream ends.
Streaming / RTMP Ingest
Streaming ingest is the process of sending video from a camera or encoder to a streaming server over a protocol such as RTMP so it can be delivered to viewers in real time.
Video Subtitles
Subtitles render spoken audio as on-screen text so the content still works for sound-off viewers and for audiences in other languages.
Social Video Import
Social video import automatically pulls videos you already published on Instagram Reels or YouTube Shorts into your own store as shoppable short-form, with no re-uploading.
Intro & Outro
Intro and outro are the holding screens shown before a broadcast starts and after it ends, used to hold early arrivals and to direct viewers to a next action.
Live Replay (VOD)
Live replay re-serves a finished broadcast on demand, converting viewers who missed the live window and making round-the-clock programming possible.
Live Pop-up
A live pop-up is an overlay shown on top of the broadcast — a notice, coupon, or product detail — used to prompt an action without interrupting viewing.
Live Quiz
A live quiz poses a question during the broadcast and rewards correct answers instantly, lifting both dwell time and chat participation.
Live Coupon
A live coupon is a discount issued in real time only to viewers of a broadcast, creating a reason to buy now rather than later.
Live Chat
Live chat is the real-time channel where viewers ask questions during a broadcast and the seller answers immediately, resolving hesitation at the moment of purchase.
Metrics
Conversion Rate (CVR)
Conversion rate is the share of visitors or viewers who actually purchase, and it typically runs higher in live commerce than on a standard product page.
Average Order Value (AOV)
Average order value is the mean amount spent per order — total revenue divided by number of orders — and it rises with bundling and upselling.
Concurrent Viewers
Concurrent viewers is the number of people watching at the same moment — unlike cumulative viewers, it reflects both real-time momentum and server load.
Engagement Rate
Engagement measures how much viewers actually react — chat, likes, quiz entries, product taps — and it predicts purchase intent better than raw view counts.
ROAS (Return on Ad Spend)
ROAS shows how much revenue each unit of ad spend produced — ad revenue divided by ad cost — and it is the standard yardstick for judging live commerce ad efficiency.
GMV (Gross Merchandise Value)
GMV is the total value of transactions over a period before cancellations, returns, and fees are deducted, which makes it different from revenue.
LTV (Customer Lifetime Value)
LTV is the total profit a customer generates across the entire relationship, which distinguishes it from average order value — the size of a single order.
CTR (Click-Through Rate)
CTR is the share of impressions that resulted in a click, and in live commerce the product card click rate is the clearest signal of purchase intent.
Bounce Rate
Bounce rate is the share of arrivals who leave without taking any action; in live commerce it means viewers who enter the broadcast and exit almost immediately.
View Completion Rate
View completion rate is the share of viewers who watch to the end — a direct driver of algorithmic distribution in short-form, and a measure of structure in live.
AI & discovery
Agentic Commerce
Agentic commerce is buying where an AI agent — not the shopper — searches, compares, and completes the purchase, which means product information has to be machine-readable to be considered at all.
AI Shopping Agent
An AI shopping agent understands a shopper's requirements and finds and recommends products on their behalf, which makes being chosen by the agent — not just by the person — the new challenge for brands.
Conversational Commerce
Conversational commerce carries a customer from question to purchase through chat or voice, with live chat and AI chatbots as its most common forms.
AEO (Answer Engine Optimization)
AEO is optimizing so that AI answer engines like ChatGPT and Perplexity cite your content as a source — unlike SEO, the goal is being included in the answer rather than ranking above it.
GEO (Generative Engine Optimization)
GEO is structuring content and schema so a brand is part of what generative AI draws on when composing an answer; in practice it is used almost interchangeably with AEO.
AI Chat Moderation
AI chat moderation automatically filters non-compliant or inappropriate messages from live chat before a human has to intervene, which is what makes live broadcasting viable in regulated industries like healthcare and finance.