By now, you’ve most likely heard of social media’s latest child on the block, TikTok. However if you happen to haven’t heard of the booming video-sharing app, you’re not alone. The newcomer to the scene has discovered its development by the early adoption of younger audiences — 60 % of US TikTok customers are between 16 and 24 years previous (and in some circumstances, customers properly under the minimal 13-year-old age requirement).
Whether or not you’ve heard of the app or not, it’s time to take discover. Up to now yr, TikTok has emerged as a social media large, beating Fb, Instagram, YouTube, and Snapchat in month-to-month installs in September 2018, and clocking over a billion downloads complete in the identical yr. The app has turn into so well-liked that Fb even quietly launched a competitor known as Lasso in November 2018 — all this whereas nonetheless flying below the radar of even essentially the most digitally savvy shoppers.
It’s clear TikTok has taken off with millennials and Gen Z customers, however are manufacturers utilizing it, too? TikTok solely lately added promoting and hyperlinking capabilities to the platform. Nonetheless, some early-adopting manufacturers are successfully utilizing TikTok to have interaction youthful audiences and increase model consciousness by quirky, quick-hit content material.
To know if TikTok must be a part of your social media technique, let’s first take a look at what it’s and why it has gained speedy reputation.
What’s TikTok?
TikTok features by offering seamless video modifying functionality, intuitive shareability, and tapping into our mysterious love of weird humor and cringe-worthy performances — it’s primarily a digital, shareable, limitless karaoke bar in your cellphone. TikTok customers movie themselves lip-syncing or performing comedic sketches in movies which might be as much as 15 seconds lengthy, and might faucet right into a database of songs, sound bites, and results. Customers may even add their very own sounds, giving different customers the power to lip-synch to their authentic video. Just like Instagram’s dwell video characteristic, TikTok customers may even collaborate in a duet format by replying to one another’s movies. Duets then show in a split-screen which different customers can then reply to, creating an limitless chain of response movies.
All of those capabilities have translated into a robust software for content material creators. Unsurprisingly, a part of the app’s excessive reputation with younger customers is its means to create viral sensations like dance challenges and obscure memes. To realize an concept of the stardom potential of TikTok, think about 20-year-old Montero Hill, in any other case referred to as Lil Nas X. After digitally releasing his now-certified hit “Outdated City” Street and selling it with comparatively little success by way of different platforms, Lil Nas X uploaded his tune to TikTok, the place it sparked a series of response movies with the hashtag #yeeyeejuice. What began as a meme ended up going so viral that file labels took discover, sparking a number of remixes that includes worldwide stars like Billy Ray Cyrus, BTS, Younger Thug, and Mason Ramsey. The rapper ultimately signed with Columbia Data, and “Outdated City Street” went on to turn into the longest-running number-one tune in Billboard Scorching 100 historical past, holding the spot for 19 weeks.
TikTok is exclusive in that its customers recurrently describe it as “a optimistic, enjoyable area.” The performance of the platform promotes democratization, and that has amounted to a major failsafe towards bullying tradition. Reasonably than the pristine, curated aesthetic that tends to dominate platforms like Instagram, TikTok’s neighborhood of on a regular basis, earnest non-celebrities sharing humiliating movies of karaoke fails and viral problem makes an attempt nearly create a tradition of radical acceptance. Moreover, TikTok incorporates a discovery web page with posts that rely not on follower rely, however on developments and well-liked jokes, which supplies customers a extra equitable alternative at fame. Although TikTok’s video view rely is seen solely to the unique poster, movies featured on the “For You” web page (the house feed that showcases the platform’s finest content material) can obtain anyplace from 50,000 to over 1 million likes. It is a large alternative for manufacturers to attach with the youthful technology in a manner that matches their values: actual, uncooked, and relatable.
three TikTok suggestions for manufacturers
Whereas there isn’t any secret sauce for creating viral content material, loads of highly-shareable content material has one aspect in widespread: viewers participation. From Lil Nas X to the ALS problem, it’s clear at the moment’s digitally savvy audiences wish to actively have interaction with their favourite manufacturers, artists, or causes. Listed here are 3 ways you possibly can check out TikTok and shortly establish whether or not the platform is a complementary match to your present built-in advertising efforts.
Submit a problem: Manufacturers seeking to achieve an viewers on TikTok may put up challenges that encourage customers on the meme-friendly app to put up their very own movies in response. For instance, Chipotle’s #guacchallenge is the platform’s highest-performing model problem thus far, proving the model’s funding in TikTok is paying off.
Share your model’s softer (or goofier) facet: Many firms use Instagram or Fb to current a extremely curated view of their model, or to share instructional, precious content material. TikTok offers manufacturers the chance to indicate a extra private, informal, and relatable behind-the-scenes take a look at their enterprise.
Be experimental: With its comparatively latest soar in reputation, it’s a bit early for tried-and-true finest practices for TikTok to exist. That being mentioned, it’s your alternative to exit on a limb — what are you able to do to have interaction this rising viewers? Take a look at early and infrequently and if it doesn’t repay, don’t be afraid to stay to what you already know works finest to your model.
The longer term: advertising with TikTok
For now, TikTok is in its gold rush section. The app’s nonetheless relative infancy within the celeb and influencer world, mixed with its huge community of surprisingly addictive humor and ensuing reactions and meta-reactions, make it a diamond mine for creators and types alike. Early adopters who’ve already amassed a big following have begun to accomplice with manufacturers. Equally, celebrities like Will Smith and Amy Schumer have turn into early celeb adopters, which can little question end in model partnership alternatives.
Anyplace media garners impressions you’ll discover manufacturers prepared to accomplice, and the timing is correct for TikTok. The app’s proprietor, Bytedance, has even claimed that in 2018, the Chinese language model of the app added a “Store Now” characteristic that generated $29 million in a single day. These sorts of numbers imply that e-commerce is a certain consideration for the American model of the app and one other potential space of income for forward-thinking manufacturers.
Whereas it’s sensible to assume strategically earlier than embracing each new know-how and platform, TikTok’s reputation signifies it may be time to start out occupied with methods to creatively combine the platform into your content material advertising and technique plans.
Afika Nxumelo is a NewsCred Contributor.
Initially printed on Nov 21, 2019 2:30 PM
