TikTok has become an unstoppable force in the social media and digital advertising world. The social video app consistently tops the iOS and Android app stores. TikTok’s major appeal is the size, growth, and loyalty of its international (and US) audience. TikTok has an audience of 800 million users worldwide.
TikTok has achieved this growth in just three years and continues to grow at exponential rates. TikTok exploded in popularity during the coronavirus pandemic with global downloads toppling 315 million downloads for the first quarter of 2020.
The app’s user statistics, engagement, and retention are impressive. Ninety percent of users open the app every single day, a captive audience that every marketer dreams of. More so, the average TikTok user interacts with the app for 52 minutes per day.
So where are all the advertisers?
Despite its meteoric rise, advertisers have generally considered TikTok “experimental,” though that may be beginning to change. According to the 2021 Hootsuite Social Trends report, just 14 percent of marketers are looking to increase their TikTok advertising spend. They worry about TikTok’s privacy, stability, audience and ad buying technology.
Beyond that, advertisers and marketers have to get over the initial learning curve of an app. The very elements that make TikTok unique and a potentially powerful tool are what make it tough to break into effectively: short-term video, many subcultures (i.e. cottagecore TikTok, Bridgerton TikTok, mental health TikTok, etc.), niche aesthetics, participatory video challenges, and a community-wide expectation of creativity. That’s intimidating to anyone, much more so a marketer, trying to enter the space.
Concerns Over Platform Stability in An Unstable World
In the grand scheme of things, TikTok is a relatively new entrant into the digital marketing and social media space. Marketers and brands are generally wary of new platforms – after all, it’s easier to do the same thing you’re already doing. Political intrigue, a global health crisis and ongoing economic doubt have riddled the last few years. These volatile elements create a public space riddled with tough decisions for marketers.
The Trump administration publicly admonished TikTok going so far as to include the app in an executive order. The order claimed TikTok posed a threat to national security and the American economy. TikTok has been fighting the effective ban and sued in August 2020, accusing the Trump administration of depriving it of due process.
Many brands and advertisers took the executive order as a sign to hold off before heavily investing in the TikTok platform. Why waste time, energy and human resources on a platform which may soon be excluded from your target audience?
For many marketers, the pandemic restricted or shelved 2021 video marketing efforts. Meanwhile, video content consumption has soared. Forward thinking marketers understand that video is an essential element of brand discovery and engagement, and many have been touting positive ROI on video content. TikTok is uniquely positioned to dominate video ad efforts as marketing dollars slowly begin to match audience demand.
An inherent trait of marketers exacerbated these factors. Marketers are naturally conservative with their money, especially as they face shrinking budgets. That leads to many advertisers deciding to wait and see. They want to see the hard data, ongoing adoption and brand success metrics. That’s part of being a good marketer. But great marketers don’t stop at the data—they push beyond the data.
source: Hootsuite
The Stigma of Instability May Be Changing
The election of Joe Biden as President of the United States has benefited TikTok. In February 2021, Biden paused former President Trump’s TikTok ban. The Biden Justice Department may drop its legal charges and ongoing investigations. Intrepid brands, especially in the e-commerce and entertainment business, are asking agencies to specifically activate and target TikTok. Plus, enhancements to TikTok’s advertising products have certainly helped alleviate advertisers’ fears.
The pandemic kickstarted a period of massive growth for TikTok and growing pains for marketers. Compounded by a hostile presidential administration and marketing budgets that shrank overnight, the marketers were slow to embrace TikTok. But that seems to have made it even more valuable in the long run, as it enabled a grassroots form of growth into a strong, distinctive app culture. But marketers don’t need to keep waiting on the sidelines. Suit up and get out there.
About the Author: Matthew Berman started Ember Networks, a digital marketing agency that specializes in services tailored to deliver targeted traffic, generate qualified leads and grow business with measurable results, in 2011 after completing his education at Tulane University. Berman has worked with brands such as Heineken, Hennessy, Delano, Fireball Whisky, The Law Center, among hundreds of others. Berman oversees all agency efforts to create click-worthy content, PPC campaigns, social marketing, and to develop aesthetically pleasing websites with back end SEO efforts. Now, in his seventh year of success since founding Ember Networks, Berman has chosen to strategically partner with lifelong friend Warren H. Cohn to create Emerald Digital, a comprehensive, full-service digital marketing agency that caters to consumer needs.