LINE official account marketing for online shops

Where LINE matters for online shops#

LINE is the everyday chat app in three markets. LY Corporation reports about 100 million monthly active users in Japan, 22 million in Taiwan and 54 million in Thailand, as of March 31, 2026 ^S1. If you sell to customers in those countries, many of them read LINE more often than their inbox.

Outside these markets LINE is much less relevant, and LINE Official Accounts are not available in the EU ^S2. A shop selling mainly in Europe or North America is better served by email and, where customers use it, WhatsApp.

A LINE Official Account is the business profile customers add as a friend. Once they add it, you can message them in the same app they use for family and friends. Adding the account is the customer’s choice, and blocking it stops your messages at once.

Account types: unverified and verified#

Every LINE Official Account starts as an unverified account. Anyone, individual or company, can open one, but it does not appear in LINE’s in-app search ^S2. Customers find it through your QR code, a link or an add-friend button on your site.

A verified account has passed LINE’s review, shows a badge and appears in in-app search. LINE currently accepts review applications only for Japan, Taiwan and Thailand ^S2. For a small shop the badge mainly adds trust and discoverability; the messaging features are the same.

The account type does not change what you pay. Message costs depend on your plan and your country, covered next.

LINE message plans and pricing by market#

LINE charges by plan, and each plan includes a number of messages a month. A message counts once for every friend it reaches: one send to 2,000 friends uses 2,000 messages, however many bubbles it contains ^S6. Replies to a customer, greeting messages and auto-replies do not count ^S3S6. When a plan without extra messages runs out, further sends fail until the next month or a plan upgrade ^S6.

The arithmetic matters more than the fee. A Taiwan shop with 4,000 friends on the Medium plan can send one message to everyone, then nothing else that month. The same shop sending to a 1,000-friend segment three times stays within quota. Check LINE’s page for your country before you budget, because prices change; Taiwan’s change on November 1, 2026 is one example ^S4.

Broadcast and targeted messages#

A broadcast goes to every friend of your account. A targeted message, called narrowcast in LINE’s developer documentation, goes to a group filtered by attributes such as age, gender or region, or by an audience you built, for example people who clicked an earlier message ^S7. LINE sets a minimum audience size for targeted sends; in Thailand the target reach must be at least 100 friends ^S5.

Because every message reached costs quota, targeting is how you control spend. Use broadcasts for news that truly applies to everyone, such as a seasonal sale opening. Use targeted messages for the rest:

• A restock note to friends who clicked the product last month.
• A size-run reminder to friends in one region before a store event.
• A follow-up to friends who opened but did not click the launch message.

Rich menus: the shop window inside the chat#

A rich menu is the tappable panel at the bottom of the chat with your account. Each area of the image can open a link, a reservation page or an account feature ^S8. It costs nothing per view, so it carries the links customers need every week without using quota.

For an apparel shop like Ninefold, a practical menu has four to six areas: New arrivals, Sale, Size guide, Track my order, Contact us and Join the newsletter. Rich menus do not appear in LINE for PC ^S8, so keep anything essential in your messages as well.

How to gain friends with consent#

On LINE, adding your account is the customer’s opt-in for LINE messages. That makes growth simple to do honestly: give people a reason to add you, and never add them yourself. Good entry points for an online shop:

• An add-friend button on product pages and the order confirmation page, with a line that says what they will receive, such as restock alerts and one sale message a month.
• A QR code on packing slips and in-store signage.
• LINE Login with the add-friend option. The customer sees a choice to add your account while signing in and decides for themselves ^S9.
• A greeting message that thanks new friends and states how often you will write. Greeting messages do not use quota ^S3.

Keep LINE consent separate from email consent. A LINE friend has not agreed to marketing email, and an email subscriber has not added you on LINE. Record where each came from, the same way you keep a consent record for email.

Using LINE and email together#

LINE and email do different jobs, and a shop selling in Taiwan, Japan or Thailand gets the most from using both. Here is how Ninefold could split an autumn launch:

Two rules keep this pleasant for customers. Do not send the same message on both channels to the same person on the same day, and stop marketing on every channel when someone asks you to stop on one. For email planning, see email segmentation for e-commerce and the new arrival template.

LINE with Tellnod in Claude or ChatGPT#

Tellnod is an MCP connector for writing, previewing and sending marketing from Claude or ChatGPT. Email works today. LINE is not available in Tellnod yet and takes early-access requests: Get early access to LINE and sign in with Google to request access. The plan is on the LINE page and LINE from Claude.

LINE in Tellnod is designed so that you connect your Official Account through a secure link instead of pasting secrets into the chat, turn an email draft into a card or carousel, and see on the approval card how much of your monthly quota the send uses before you press Confirm. The AI cannot press Confirm for you, and LINE bills its plan to you directly.

Today you can prepare the email half. After you connect Tellnod, prompts like these work in Claude or ChatGPT:

• “Email Taiwan customers who bought outerwear last year about the autumn coats, in Traditional Chinese, with the lookbook link.”
• “Show me the mobile preview, then send a test to me.”
• “How many people opened the launch email but didn’t click?”

LINE is designed to use the same contacts, brand and segments as email. Plans and prices are on the pricing page.

FAQ#