Running a small business has never been particularly easy, but I think the current environment is forcing business owners to become much more creative about how they find customers.
People are watching what they spend. According to the latest ONS figures, the cost of living remains one of the biggest concerns for people in Britain. In August 2026, 55% of adults said their cost of living had increased compared with the previous month, while 59% said they were spending less on non-essentials.
If you run a small business, that matters. Your customers may still want what you offer, but they're thinking harder before they spend their money. At the same time, you still have your own bills to pay and somehow need to keep finding new customers.
So I've been thinking about something.
Could LIVE streaming be one of the most underused tools small businesses have available to them right now?
The Problem Isn't Always Your Business. Sometimes People Just Don't Know You Exist.
I have run businesses myself, so I know how frustrating this can be. You can have a brilliant service, years of experience, happy customers and a great website, but none of that helps very much if the next person who needs what you do never discovers you.
Traditionally, businesses solved that problem by advertising. You paid to put yourself in front of people and hoped enough of them became customers to justify what you had spent.
Social media changed that because suddenly we could reach people ourselves. But somewhere along the way, social media marketing became another enormous job. We were told to create endless posts, photographs, Reels, Stories, emails and videos, while also trying to actually run the business.
I think LIVE streaming offers something slightly different because instead of constantly creating content about your expertise, you can simply turn the camera on and demonstrate it.
A therapist can talk about why we repeat certain relationship patterns. A yoga teacher can demonstrate a technique. A stylist can help somebody choose an outfit. A psychic can give readings. A nutritionist can answer general questions. A florist can demonstrate how to create an arrangement. A coach can take a problem from the audience and work through it.
You are effectively giving people the opportunity to experience your business before they decide whether they want to buy from it.
When Money Is Tight, Trust Becomes Even More Important
This is the part I think matters during a cost-of-living crisis.
If somebody has plenty of disposable income, trying a new service or buying something from an unfamiliar business doesn't necessarily feel like a big decision. When money is tight, every purchase gets scrutinised more carefully.
People want to know whether something is worth it.
For expert-led businesses, LIVE video gives you an opportunity to answer that question without constantly telling people how brilliant you are.
Someone can watch you.
They can hear what you know, see how you communicate, ask you something and observe how you respond. Over time they begin to understand who you are and whether they trust you.
That doesn't guarantee they'll buy anything, of course, but it removes some of the distance between a business and a potential customer.
And I think that matters more now than it did when people had more money to experiment with.
Your Phone Has Quietly Become A Broadcasting Studio
This is probably why I find all of this so fascinating.
I came from television. For most of my broadcasting career, reaching thousands of people required studios, cameras, producers, presenters, transmission equipment and a considerable amount of money.
Today a small business owner can potentially reach an audience using something they already have sitting in their pocket.
That's an extraordinary change.
TikTok itself is increasingly positioning LIVE as part of the shopping and discovery experience. In the UK, TikTok says more than 6,000 TikTok Shop LIVE sessions are taking place every day, and LIVE shopping has grown 55% year-on-year.
Of course, those figures come from TikTok and much of the data relates specifically to businesses selling physical products through TikTok Shop, so we shouldn't pretend that every therapist, coach or independent service business will experience the same results.
But I think the direction of travel is interesting.
People are becoming increasingly comfortable discovering businesses through video and interacting with them in real time.
What If You Don't Sell Products?
This is where I think many small businesses misunderstand TikTok LIVE.
They see someone selling handbags, cosmetics or clothes and think, “Well, that's not relevant to me. I sell a service.”
But you don't necessarily need to sell something during the LIVE for the LIVE to have commercial value.
If you're a hypnotherapist, perhaps somebody watches you talking about anxiety for twenty minutes and later looks at your website.
If you're a relationship coach, someone might watch several of your LIVEs before deciding to book a session.
If you're a Medium, somebody may watch you give readings and eventually decide they'd like a private appointment.
If you're a yoga teacher, somebody could discover you through a LIVE and later attend one of your classes.
The transaction doesn't always need to happen on TikTok.
Sometimes LIVE is simply where the relationship begins.
We Need To Stop Thinking Only In Followers
One of the things I would love small businesses to stop obsessing about is follower numbers.
Obviously, having an audience is useful. But if you run a small business, you don't necessarily need millions of people watching you.
You need the right people to discover you.
I'd rather have 30 people watching a therapist LIVE where three of them are genuinely interested in working with that person than 30,000 people watching a piece of content that has absolutely nothing to do with their business.
Small businesses understand this instinctively offline. Nobody goes to a networking event and complains that only 50 people attended because another event had 50,000.
You care whether the people in the room are relevant.
We need to start applying some of that thinking online too.
The Numbers Around Small Businesses Are Interesting
TikTok commissioned research published this year estimating that the platform helped UK SMEs generate £3.4 billion in additional revenue during 2025. According to that research, 84% of UK businesses using TikTok said it had helped increase their sales and revenue. Those are TikTok-commissioned figures, so I think they should be understood in that context, but they're still worth paying attention to.
TikTok has also been actively trying to attract British small businesses. Its Shop Local programme was specifically designed to help UK SMEs find new customers through videos, creators and LIVE streams.
Something is clearly changing in how businesses are being discovered.
And I don't think small service businesses should assume this shift only applies to people selling products.
Maybe Small Businesses Don't Need To Become Better Marketers
This is where I've landed after spending so much time looking at TikTok LIVE.
For years we've told small business owners they need to become marketers.
Learn SEO. Learn social media. Learn email marketing. Learn funnels. Learn advertising. Learn content creation.
All of those things can be useful, but perhaps we are overlooking something much simpler.
Maybe some small business owners need to become better broadcasters.
If you are genuinely brilliant at what you do, perhaps your marketing doesn't always need to involve creating another perfectly designed post explaining it.
Maybe sometimes you need to turn the camera on and let people experience it.
Talk.
Teach.
Demonstrate.
Answer questions.
Invite another expert into the conversation.
Let people get to know you.
That doesn't require you to become an influencer. It requires you to learn how to communicate your expertise through a modern broadcasting platform.
And those are two very different things.
Is LIVE Streaming Going To Save Every Small Business?
Of course not.
LIVE streaming isn't going to solve rising costs, suddenly give consumers more disposable income or fix a business that doesn't have a viable product or service.
It also takes time. You need to learn how to broadcast, develop an audience, understand what people respond to and create a sensible route between someone watching you and eventually becoming a customer.
But when small businesses are looking carefully at every pound they spend on marketing, I think a technology that allows you to broadcast directly to potential customers from a device you already own deserves serious consideration.
Particularly because something else is happening at the same time.
Consumers aren't just buying products anymore. They are discovering the people behind businesses.
And for a small business, that can actually be an advantage.
A large company can outspend you on advertising. It can have a bigger marketing department, a more sophisticated website and a much larger budget.
But it can't be you.
Your personality, knowledge, story, humour, experience and relationship with your customers are things a large competitor cannot easily replicate.
LIVE gives you somewhere to use them.
Perhaps The Question Isn't Whether You Like Social Media
I meet plenty of brilliant experts who tell me they don't really like social media.
I understand it.
But I think small business owners may need to separate the question of whether they personally enjoy social media from the question of how their customers are discovering businesses.
Those aren't necessarily the same thing.
If consumer behaviour continues moving towards video, creators, social discovery and LIVE interaction, then businesses that learn how to communicate in those environments may have an enormous advantage over those that continue waiting for customers to find their website.
You don't need to be everywhere.
You don't need to chase every trend.
And you definitely don't need to spend your entire working life making content.
But perhaps learning how to turn on a camera, talk confidently about what you know and build relationships with the people watching is becoming a genuine small-business skill.
Twenty years ago, a small business needed to understand why it needed a website.
Ten years ago, it needed to understand social media.
I wonder whether the next shift is learning how to broadcast.
And with customers watching every pound they spend, the businesses that can show people who they are, demonstrate their value and build genuine trust may be the ones that are much harder to overlook.
Want To Explore What LIVE Could Do For Your Business?
This is exactly the thinking behind The Conscious Creator Network. We work specifically with psychic, spiritual, wellbeing and personal development experts who want to use TikTok LIVE to build their audience, authority and wider business.
You don't need to already be a TikTok creator or know how to broadcast. We help our creators develop those skills, understand what works for their particular expertise and create a route from LIVE viewer to community and, where appropriate, customer.
The Conscious Creator Network is free to join. There is no joining fee and we don't take commission from your TikTok LIVE earnings. TikTok pays us directly to support and develop creators within our network.
Find Out More About The Conscious Creator Network
Claire Anstey
Founder, The Conscious Creator Network
Broadcaster | Therapist | Creator Trainer