Our Social Media Marketing Agency – Thoughts On TikTok
The rise of TikTok over the past year has been astronomical. The content-creation app revolving around short-form videos now has over 800 million users across the globe. Considering just how new a platform it is – having only started back in September 2016.- that’s one seriously impressive figure. But why exactly has it taken off in the way that it has? Kids are using it, grandparents are using it – kids are doing it with their grandparents (see a certain Dame Judi Dench…). The team here at VerriBerri, a leading social media marketing agency in the South-East, wanted to put their finger on what exactly makes TikTok, well, tick.
What’s The Appeal?
Now, I have a confession to make here, I was one of the TikTok non-believers for a very long time. Even now, I’m by no means a religious user of it, but one thing I can’t deny is how fun, engaging and, strangely, how community-driven it is. It has tapped into a niche that was previously unfilled by the other leading social media platforms. One of the definitive traits of today’s generations is the short attention span and TikTok plays into that perfectly.
We asked around our social media marketing agency what they thought the main plus-point of TikTok was? Their answer? Resoundingly, it was the brevity of the videos. The short duration meant you could digest lots of different information but in a smaller amount of time. As a platform, it doesn’t take itself too seriously; self-depreciative humour is the dish of the day when it comes to TikTok! There’s less of the pretence surrounding it than on Instagram, say, whilst the toxicity that pervades Twitter is seen much less on TikTok videos.
Challenges And Trends
The semi-gamification of TikTok is another reason it’s seen such success. The dance challenges and other trends that have circulated amongst its users mean that people can’t help but be drawn in, subsequently sharing it to a larger and larger audience. With the help of these challenges, TikTok has tapped into a deeply primal, human fear – FOMO. It’s hard not to be struck by the fear of missing out (FOMO), especially when everyone is seemingly talking about the latest TikTok viral sensation. This feeds into a cycle as the more people that then participate or get on board with the platform, the more who don’t use it will be subjected to the usual “have you seen the new X & Y on TikTok?!”. As a social media marketing agency, our job has always been to tap into human traits and trends, and TikTok is jam-packed with them.
Part Of A Bigger Societal Shift
Many people under the age of 18 were already beginning to shift away from media such as television before TikTok’s inception three years ago. Talk to any adolescent and the chances are there’ll be able to name you as many famous YouTubers as they are household-name actors. Teenagers like to have lots of different things going on at once. They like to be messaging their friends, passively watch a YouTube video and scroll through TikTok videos all at the same time. This digital smorgasbord of multi-tasking is something now ingrained into the habitual routines of youngsters the world over.
Massively Accessible
TikTok is arguably the most accessible social media platform out there. There are little to no barriers from jumping onto it and just creating. You can create unique masterpieces, you can create something from a template or something that’s in between the two. There’s no end goal, just a community looking to entertain one another in whatever way possible.
A major function of Twitter is to inform; Instagram is used to promote, brand, market and collaborate. But TikTok? It’s used to entertain, and not a lot else beyond that. It’s blissfully simple, then, in its success. It doesn’t rely on huge swathes of new features constantly being churned out, its central premise is easily strong enough to keep on bringing people in. This is not something that a lot of social media platforms can boast. The fact that in 2019 it was downloaded more than both Instagram and Snapchatis a mark of its success.
Some Staggering Statistics
- Average daily time spent on TikTok comes in at a whopping 45 minutes. Given that, as a conservative estimate, people are awake for around 16 hours per day, that means people are spending roughly 5% of their waking time on TikTok each day!
- TikTok is in the top 25 downloaded apps in 134 countries (out of a possible 195 countries). It has well and truly taken over the globe.
- 90% of TikTok users are using the platform multiple times per day. This is easy to explain, as soon as people get bored or have a spare five minutes knocking around their day, they’ll whip out their phone to watch some short videos. It’s easy, requires little effort and even more than that, needs even less concentration.
- TikTok is no longer just a preserve of the teenage kingdom. It was found in 2019, that in just 18 months the number of US adults using the app had multiplied 5.5 times. This is partially because there’s more content being created by adults, but also because more adults are being introduced into the TikTok world by teenagers, themselves. Whole families are getting in on the act nowadays!
Contact Us
Nobody can say for certain whether the craze surrounding TikTok will continue long into the future. However, one thing is for certain. It’s big now and that’s all that anyone should be focussed on. So, if you’d like to find out more about our social media marketing agency, then get in touch! Contact VerriBerri today on 01376 386 850. Why not have a look at our TikTok account whilst you’re at it!
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