In today’s fast-paced digital marketplace, audiences enjoy live-selling events because it offers an interactive, real-time shopping experience that combines entertainment and convenience. In a 2024 survey by Rakuten Insight, 41% of Singapore-based respondents have shopped from a livestream at least once in 2024. This showcases livestreaming’s potential to reach out to new audiences and encourage consumer conversions.

Live selling on social platforms has evolved through the years, going from simple Facebook live sessions to multi-channel live selling — making it a highly interactive experience, reaching millions across multiple social media and web channels. In this article, we’ll break down how to use multistreaming to help you and your business thrive in today’s competitive live selling arena.

Why multistream your live shopping event?

Multi-livestream selling involves broadcasting an interactive live shopping event, such as a product try-on or demonstration, Q&A session, or sales pitch to multiple online platforms simultaneously. Sellers achieve this through specialised software or cloud-based services to distribute their live video feed to various social media channels, e-commerce websites, and custom platforms at the same time. Sellers can easily maximise their reach and potential revenue with just one livestream.

Multistream live shopping events are highly beneficial for businesses, influencers, or creators who want to expand their reach, engage audiences across platforms, and drive higher sales conversion — all while saving time and money with one unified broadcast. The key benefits for sellers hosting multistream live shopping events include:

Expand your reach

• By streaming to multiple platforms such as Youtube, Facebook, Instagram, Tiktok and Shopee Live, you can increase your visibility and connect with new customers from diverse platforms.

Protect Against Single-Platform Risk

• Each social platform has its own algorithm, rules, and audience dynamics. By multistreaming, you reduce the risk of your livestream underperforming on a single platform, ensuring that your content still reaches viewers even if one platform’s promotion falls short.

Boost Engagement and Conversions

• By simultaneously streaming on multiple platforms, you can interact with wider audiences in real time, engaging many potential buyers with a single stream. Each platform may also have different monetization features such as subscriptions, advertisements, real-time donations. Thus, multistreaming allows you to capitalise on these opportunities, increasing your revenue.

Key Pain Points and Solutions

While multistreaming onto different platforms may seem daunting at first, Spree’s live streaming shopping features can help to make multistreaming a smooth-sailing process.

Spree is the simplest multi-channel live commerce platform, allowing you to connect with your audience across various social media platforms. Spree unifies your multistream live studio, online store, social channel sales, inventory systems and analytics in one platform with a starting price of $0 a month, making it easier and affordable for you to curate live shopping experiences.

Here’s an overview of how Spree’s multistreaming services address these pain points.

1. Managing Real Time Engagement (Figure 1)

• While multistreaming on Spree, you can interact with your audience in real time through the live chat features. Reply and connect with your audience on various platforms and Spree automatically ensures the message is delivered to the correct platform.
• Spree is also equipped with dynamic engagement tools such as flash deals, live auctions, and lucky draws, which you can use to keep the livestream fun.

2. Sharing Shoppable Links & Checkout Flow (Figure 2)

• On Spree, you can create your very own web store for your products. Your products are directly linked to your multi-channel livestream through shoppable overlay cards, so viewers can shop directly from the store — wherever they are.
• Spree generates shoppable links that you can share and helps to facilitate the checkout process for your audience. This ensures that even with minimal effort, you can design a smooth-running online shop.

3. Audience Fragmentation and Analytics

• Spree also provides sellers with a live shopping analytics dashboard that keeps track of sale KPIs and the UTM tagging used per product on each platform. This centralised information can help you better understand how to improve your customer’s live shopping experience.

4. Repurposing Live Content (Figure 3)

• Once you have finished your live stream, Spree lets you save the footage. This means you can repurpose your live shopping stream for social media reels, blog embeds, instructional product demos, and so on. This saves you time from recording new content to market your products and livestreams.

Step-By-Step Guide to Multistream on Instagram & Web

Now that you’ve gotten an overview of how Spree’s multi stream live shopping services help you stream across Instagram, social media, and other web platforms, here’s a live shopping multistream setup guide to get you started.

1. Choose your multistreaming platform

Before picking a multistreaming tool, consider these key factors:

• Platform Support: What level of support do you need? Some tools offer 24/7 live chat, while others provide only email support during business hours (e.g. 9 AM–6 PM on weekdays).
• Ease of Use: Is the tool beginner-friendly, or will it take time to learn? If there’s a learning curve, are you prepared to invest the time to master it?
• Cost: What’s your budget? Do you want to invest in a premium tool now, or would you prefer to start with a free version and upgrade as you gain experience?

Spree is an easy-to-use multistreaming platform, designed to have you ready for your liveshopping experiences. With plans starting at $0 per month, Spree allows you to scale up to more dynamic premium features as you grow.

2. Connect your social media accounts – Instagram, Web, and more

To stream your live shopping event on Instagram and your website at the same time, you’ll need to set up your connection using RTMP URLs and stream keys. These are unique links and codes provided by each platform (Instagram, your website, etc.) that tell your streaming software where to send your live video.

Once you have these details, simply copy and paste them into your multistreaming tool (like Spree, OBS, Streamlabs) during setup. This ensures your live stream is correctly broadcasted across all your selected platforms at the same time.

3. Configure Shoppable Overlays

Webstore with shoppable links

Shoppable overlays make it easier for viewers to browse and buy your products during your live stream. In Spree, you can add these by creating product cards on your webstore. These are clickable boxes that display the product’s name, price, and a buy button linking back to your webstore’s checkout page.

Once you’ve added your product cards in Spree, it’s important to test the links and buttons before going live. Ensure the links work across the platforms you are streaming on, allowing for a seamless live shopping experience.

4. Test Your Stream

Before going live, check that everything is working smoothly to avoid errors during your live stream. Here’s a checklist on what to look out for:

• Audio & Video (A/V): Make sure your camera and microphone are working properly. Check that your picture is clear, your sound is crisp, and everything is well-lit.
• Latency: Test for any delay between what you say and what viewers see. The lower the delay, the better your audience can interact with you in real time.
• Chat: Check that your chat displays correctly and you can see messages coming in from all platforms. If you have a moderator, make sure that they can also see and respond to comments.

If something goes wrong during your live stream, do not panic. Here are some troubleshooting tips to help you navigate it.

• If your video lags or freezes, try lowering its resolution. For example, you can drop video quality from 1080p to 720p.
• If your audio cuts off, try reconnecting your microphone or switching to a backup microphone.
• If your Wi-Fi connection is patchy, try using a wired connection instead of relying on wireless connection. This ensures a smoother livestream and avoids the risk of lags due to poor internet connection.

5. Go Live & Monitor

When you’re ready to go live, consider starting a countdown timer to give viewers more time to join your stream. This helps to increase viewership at the start of the livestream.

As you stream, Spree lets you monitor each channel in real-time and adjust accordingly. You may want to keep an eye on:

• Viewer numbers across platforms
• Comments section, including questions or conversations
• Stream quality (audio, video, connection)

By actively monitoring these, you can quickly fix any issues that may pop up, ensuring a smooth viewing experience for your audience.

Troubleshooting Common Issues

As livestream shopping experiences happen in real-time, facing the occasional hiccup is inevitable. Thus, it’s recommended to learn how to troubleshoot common issues that happen during live streams. These tips will help you fix issues right away, minimising disturbance to your audience’s shopping experience.

Low Resolution or Buffering

If your stream is low quality, blurry or keeps buffering, the likely cause is poor internet connection or overly high stream settings. Firstly, you need to check your internet speed and ensure it is around 5-10 Mbps upload for stable HD streaming. If your speed is slower, reduce your streaming quality to 720p through your multistreaming application (Spree, OBS, or Restream). Close other apps that may be taking up connection or switch to a wired connection to ensure stability.

Chat Lag or Missing Comments

If you notice delays in the chat updates or missing comments on your platforms, start by refreshing your screen. If that does not work, check that your multistream platform’s chat integrations are still active. Sometimes, you have to reauthorise the connection. If the lag persists, you may need to ask someone to monitor the comments on each platform as a backup.

Checkout Link Failures

If viewers report that a checkout / product link is not working, test the link on your device during the stream. You may also ask someone else to help with this in the background, and notify your viewers. Have a backup link to send in the chat or a QR code to show onto the screen, to help your customers purchase the product in the meantime. After your stream, you can review the links and update them on your store.

Analytics Data Gaps

Not all social media platforms will report analytics data in real time or at the same level of detail. If you notice any missing or incomplete data, verify that your tracking links, UTM tags, or platform analytics connections are properly set up. Use platform-specific promo codes or links to track sales per channel manually if needed. After the stream, cross-check platform analytics dashboards (e.g. Facebook Live Insights, TikTok analytics, YouTube Studio) to fill in any gaps.

Best Practices & Pro Tips

Running a successful multi stream live shopping event takes more than just hitting the “Go Live” button. To stand out in the competitive live-selling industry, you need to plan, promote, and engage strategically to turn viewers into buyers. Here’s an overview of best practices to help you attract more viewers, keep them engaged, and drive sales throughout your stream.

Advanced Promotion

To maximise your viewership and capture a wider audience, you need to promote your live shopping event 3-7 days in advance across your social media channels. This increases the event’s awareness amongst your audience, and reminds them to join your event once you go live. You can do this by:

• Posting teasers with images or short videos on your social media accounts
• Adding scheduled event links to your Facebook, Youtube, and website page
• Sending email and SMS reminders to your customer base

Interactive Widgets

During your live multistream, you can boost engagement by adding interactive elements such as polls, Q&A boxes, scannable QR overlays, clickable links, and more. Spree offers these gamified experiences allowing you to easily host flash deals, live auctions and lucky draws.

This encourages your audience to actively participate during the livestream. This also helps you get to know your audiences’ preferences, which you can use to create more engaging streaming experiences in the future.

Exclusive Deals

You can also offer special deals only available during the live stream event to create a sense of urgency and excitement for your audience. Some ideas include:

• Limited time discount codes flashed onto the screen
• Flash sale announcements mid-stream
• Free shipping on purchases made during the livestream

Measuring Success

Measuring your success is essential for hosting better multi stream live shopping events in the future. It goes beyond simply tracking viewer numbers and likes — it means analysing key metrics like engagement, sales performance, and platform-specific results to make data-driven decisions that refine and improve your strategy.

Spree’s Dashboard

Recommended Key KPIs

Here is an overview of the 3 KPIs you will need to measure the performance of your livestream across multiple platforms. By understanding these KPIs, you can better improve your livestream by adjusting your CTR, stream duration and engagement techniques.

Cross-Platform Comparison

While multistreaming, it’s essential to compare the performance of each platform to understand where your audience is more engaged and where your sales are coming from. Examine the KPIs above for every platform along with other metrics such as:

• Viewership Numbers: Which platforms attracted the most viewers?
• Engagement Rate: Where did viewers comment, like, react the most?
• Sales Performance: Which platform generated the highest conversion rate?

By comparing these data points, you can identify your strongest platforms, refine your future sales strategies, and allocate your resources more effectively.

Spree Analytics & Google Analytics

Spree’s multi-channel live stream analytics was designed to give you real-time insights on your live-shopping event. On your dashboard, you can track your:

• Viewer count across platforms
• Product clicks and purchases during the stream
• Engagement interactions such as polls, Q&As, reactions

At the same time, use Google Analytics to gain deeper insights into your website’s performance after your live stream, such as:

• Traffic sources
• On-site behaviour like dwell time and bounce rates
• Conversion tracking linked to live shopping CTAs

By using both Spree and Google Analytics, you can better understand the performance of your webstore and live shopping events. This empowers you to improve your product selections, refine your promotional strategies, and craft a more engaging experience for your viewers.

Repurposing your live shopping content

With all the hard work and effort you put into planning your livestream shopping event, it is essential to extend the value of your content. Repurposing your livestream helps you maximize its impact and saves you the time and effort of creating new content from scratch. Here are some ideas to help you make the most of your livestream content.

Short-Form Clips for Socials

• Turn the highlights from your livestreams into short-form clips for platforms like Instagram (Reels), Tiktok, Youtube or Facebook. Focus on moments that showcase new products and exciting offers. These clips can help attract new followers and promote live shopping events.

Embedding Recordings in Blog / Product Pages

• Add full or edited recordings of your livestream to your blog, product pages, or FAQs. This allows potential customers to better understand your products with a recorded demonstration which answers commonly-asked questions. This can also be helpful to support SEO efforts.

Follow-Up Email Campaigns

• Add a livestream replay to your follow-up email campaign, sending it to customers who may have missed it.
• You can also throw in exclusive offers or reminders to help increase conversions.

FAQs

What equipment and software do I need to start my live shopping event?

• You will need:

i. A good camera (iPhone, webcam, mirrorless camera)

ii. Clear microphone

iii. Stable, high speed internet connection

iv. Multistreaming software (Spree, Restream, or Streamyard)

How can I ensure my stream stays high quality across Instagram and web?

• Test your internet speed, and aim for at least 5-10 Mbps uploading speed for HD streaming
• Stream at platform-friendly settings (720p minimum, when bandwidth is limited)
• Close apps that may be using internet
• Run a test stream to check on your video, audio and overlays
• Use a wired connection instead of Wi-Fi to prevent lag

What’s the best way to aggregate and respond to comments from multiple platforms?

• Use multistreaming tools such as Spree, Restream Chat or Streamyard, which display comments from various platforms in one place. This makes it easier for you to monitor and respond to your customer’s comments in real time.
• You can also hire a moderator, who will respond to customer interactions on your behalf.

Can I track sales performance per platform when multistreaming?

• You can use platform-specific promo codes, links or UTM tags to see where sales come from.
• Leverage analytics tools built into your multistreaming platform such as Spree to see your data dashboard across multiple platforms
• If you also have a website, combine these insights with Google Analytics to understand traffic sources and onsite behavior on your website.